D. Equal Protection Before the Law Women Human Rights defenders continue to oppose the recently passed Anti-Terror Bill, highlighting its impact on women’s exercise of their rights to freedom of assembly and right to organize. In several webinars organized by the Commission during the 18 day campaign to end VAW in 2020, and in women’s month this 2021, organizations consistently raised concerns regarding the human rights impact of the law. Serious concerns were raised on how the law is being used to target human rights organizations and community organizers, many are women. Atty. Virgie Lacsa-Suarez, the lead lawyer of the all women petition against the Anti-Terror law called the passage of the contested legislation as a form of weaponizing the law to quell all forms of dissent and to silence women. Together with the organizations and individual women petitioners, Atty. Virgie Lacsa-Suarez calls for collective action among women saying “we all believe that silence breeds violence, silence breeds impunity, and silence will breed more violence. And therefore, let us not be silenced, let us continue to speak up and stand up against Anti-Terror Act.” In the Commission’s regional offices, even before the passage of the Anti-Terror law, complaints and requests for assistance due to red tagging were already received. With the passage of the law, Central and Regional offices continue to receive complaints and request for legal assistance relative to it. For instance, in Region IV, a member of the LGBTQI community complained of benign red tagged and visited by persons who introduced themselves as law enforcement and asking his parents questions about his organizational affiliations, with insinuations of his involvement with the communist party. 54 III. Women in the marginalized sector Rural Women Farmers are among the poorest among the basic sectors in the country. This is more so for women farmers, who are often excluded from ownership of lands, discriminated against in the access to resources for production and are primarily stradled with the burden of unpaid care. As was in 2020, Rural women continue to bear the brunt of the pandemic. But additionally, they also had to bear the impact of government policies that negatively impact them such as the Rice Tariffication Law. As articulated by a representative by AMIHAN “Tatlong dagok sa ekonomiya ang naranasan ng ating mga magsasakang kababaihan dulot pandemya, dulot ng epekto nung Rice Liberalization Law, at dulot nung mga kalamidad na sunud-sunod na naranasan ng ating mga mamamayang Pilipino” ([Rural women] faced triple economic hurdles - that of the pandemic, that brought about by the impact of the Rice Liberalization law, and those brought about by natural disasters) Quarantine restrictions have also severely impacted the capacity of rural women to market their goods -thereby affecting their food security. AMIHAN speaker Catherine Estavillo further shared 54 CHR IV-A, List of cases against LGBTQI 2016-2020, Submitted to CHR-GEWHRC 15