A Philippine Catholic school is withholding the diplomas of six high-school boys who uploaded Facebook photographs that appear to show them kissing one another, an education official said yesterday.
A day earlier, a Philippine court rejected another Catholic school’s decision to bar five girls from graduation ceremonies because they had posed in bikinis for photographs posted on Facebook. The cases test the limits of privacy in a conservative Catholic nation that is also among the world’s most prolific users of social networking sites.
Philippine Department of Education officer Samuel Mergenio said the six boys told him they had taken prank photographs to make it appear that their lips touched. One of the boys uploaded the pictures on Facebook and mistakenly made them available to others, Mergenio said.
The pictures were not taken at the boys’ school, Infant Jesus Academy in the Manila suburb of Marikina, but the students were wearing school uniforms, he said.
Mergenio said the school chancellor informed the department late on Thursday that the boys would be allowed to participate in the graduation ceremony, but “the release of their diplomas will be delayed.”
He said the school did not say when the diplomas would be handed over and that he was awaiting a formal written report from the school.
The school chancellor was not available for comment yesterday.
The mother of the boy who uploaded the photographs said she works as a nurse in Saudi Arabia and went home only to attend the graduation of her son, one of twins.
She said she refused to attend the graduation ceremony because her son would be subjected to ridicule as he would not be called to the stage to receive his diploma.
“It would be like an insult,” she said.
On Thursday, a judge in central Cebu City issued a restraining order against St Theresa’s College High School, ordering it to allow the five students who appeared in the bikini photographs to take part in graduation ceremonies scheduled for yesterday.
The school, which declined to comment asked the court to reconsider. The girls’ lawyer, Cornelio Mercado, said yesterday that the school was still insisting on banning the students while its motion for reconsideration is pending.
Mercado said one Facebook photograph at issue showed a girl holding a cigarette and a liquor bottle, while others showed all five wearing bikinis at a beach party held for the 16th birthday of one the girls, in December last year.
The mother of the girl who hosted the party said a security guard barred the group yesterday from entering the school campus.
“They were really hurt,” she said.
School officials took action against the girls for what they called “engaging in immoral, indecent, obscene or lewd acts,” according to court records.
They said the students would graduate, but could not participate in activities or ceremonies.
Earlier this month, the five girls were summoned by the principal and other school officials, “dressed down” and called “sluts,” Mercado said.
Judge Wilfredo Navarro of the Regional Trial Court, castigated school officials for calling the girls “inappropriate names.” He said not allowing them to participate in graduation activities “would indeed be most un-Christian if not entirely inhuman.”
The mother of one girl had petitioned the court on behalf of her daughter. Mercado said the ruling applied to all five.
The families yesterday filed charges of “grave oral defamation’’ and illegal use of photographs showing minors against the school, Mercado said, alleging that school officials had illegally obtained the pictures because they were not Facebook “friends” of the girls and were not allowed access.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not