MANILA, 5 August 2003 — Police filed charges against Sen. Gregorio “Gringo” Honasan, four senior military officers and two civilians yesterday, accusing them of backing last week’s failed armed forces mutiny as a way to topple President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

Sen. Honasan, now in hiding, is the highest official so far to be implicated in the July 27 uprising by more than 350 officers and enlisted men, who took over a ritzy apartment building and mall in the heart of Manila’s financial district.

“Definitely, he’s one of the leaders,” Interior Secretary Jose Lina said of Honasan, a former maverick army officer who staged two attempted coups in the 1980s.

“The soldiers were not acting by themselves,” Lina told a news conference, adding that the goal of the mutiny was “to grab political power.”

Earlier yesterday, Arroyo said an investigation into the mutiny had produced a wealth of evidence that could lead to the identification of all those involved in the uprising. She refused to provide details.

Arroyo said she may be able to lift a state of rebellion — which allows arrest without warrant of any suspected conspirator — earlier than expected. She did not give a date.

There have been concerns that the continuation of the decree could further scare investors and tourists. The stock market fell 3 percent yesterday.

Lina said investigators believe as many as 1,000 other people were involved in the uprising, and police have submitted documents to the Justice Department that would allow them to be identified and prosecuted. Many are part of a military-civilian fraternity called Philippine Guardians Brotherhood Inc., which is opposed to Arroyo’s rule.

They could face life imprisonment, if convicted.

Police presented to prosecutors the sworn statement of one of their witnesses, Perfecto Ragil, who claimed that Honasan advocated the use of force to achieve reforms in a June 4 meeting of some of the mutineers.

After the meeting, Honasan and the mutineers allegedly drew blood from their arms with a knife as a show of solidarity, said the testimony of Ragil, a military employee who said he attended the meeting but backed out from joining the mutiny.

Honasan denied the charges against him in a telephone interview with reporters. “I was never in any secret meeting where there was a blood compact, where the plot to launch the incident took place,” Honasan said, refusing to say where he was.

Lina alleged that the mutineers occupied the Oakwood apartment and hotel as well as the adjoining Glorietta 4 mall complex, and then waited for their civilian backers, including Guardian members, to protest in support of their uprising.

But the mutiny collapsed after riot police and progovernment soldiers blocked the planned protest.

Honasan, 55, helped lead the “people power” revolt that ousted late dictator Ferdinand Marcos and swept Corazon Aquino to the presidency in 1986. He later led at least two coup attempts against Aquino, was arrested once for his coup role, but escaped from a prison ship. He won a Senate seat in 1995.

Others charged yesterday were Capt. Felix Turingan, Col. Briones, Col. Lazo, retired Col. Ernest Macahiya and civilians Lina Reyes and George Duldulao, Lina said. He did not elaborate on their alleged involvement and did not give some of their full names.

Duldulao is reportedly an aide of Honasan.

Last week, prosecutors filed coup charges against the more than 300 mutineers, who are being held in military detention, and a former aide of ousted President Joseph Estrada.