Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing (AML/CFT) regulations have been abused by the government of the Philippines to crack down on civil society. During the administration of former President Rodrigo Duterte, amendments to the anti-terrorism act were passed, which allowed for the treatment of advocacy and dissent as terrorism and violent extremism. At the same time, the practice of vilifying or red tagging activists and progressive organisations as communist fronts was increasing. These practices together have allowed for the arrest and detention of large numbers of activists. Further any organisations linked to the communist movement are labelled as a terrorist organisation.
Many progressive CSOs faced bank inquiries and freezing of assets due to this labelling. This has led to the disruption of CSOs' legitimate activities, the crippling of their operations and threatening their existence altogether.
