On January 24th 2019, two Manobo farmers, Randel Gallego and Emel Tejero, residents of Km. 16, Brgy. Diatagon, went missing after they were allegedly fired upon by soldiers. "The massive human rights violations committed against the Indigenous Peoples (IPs) or Lumads and peasants are designed to silence the opposition to the continuing operations of large-scale mining and plantations in Northern Mindanao and the rest of Caraga Region", was the assessment by the environmental group Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment or Kalikasan PNE. “The military is trying to flush out the opposition to mining and plantation interests in Northern Mindanao and Caraga region,” said Kalikasan PNE Coordinator Leon Dulce. Dulce pointed out that these Lumad and peasant leaders are the environmental defenders that continue to stand and oppose the large-scale mining and plantation operations in the said areas in Mindanao. At present, these environmental defenders are protecting around 243,163 hectares of forest and agricultural lands within their ancestral domains and farmlands against the encroachment of these extractive and destructive projects in Northern Mindanao and Caraga Region, he added. Hundreds of Lumad residents from Sitio Manluy-a, Panukmoan, and Decoy in Barangay Diatagon, Lianga town in Surigao del Sur fled from their homes after the Armed Forces of the Philippines conducted a series of artillery bombardment and harassments last January 21. The 401st Infantry Brigade of the Philippine Army claimed that Gallego and Tejero were killed in a clash between soldiers and the New People’s Army (NPA) rebels. But human rights advocates belied the military’s claim, saying that the two were unarmed civilians. “The Lumad communities in Lianga are standing firmly against the coal and gold mining exploration and development projects attempting to grab lands and resources from their ancestral lands ensconced within the Andap River Valley Complex. For this, they are constantly being attacked by the military,” Dulce said.