Former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte faces senate inquiry into drug killings

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Former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte faces senate inquiry into drug killings

时间：2024-10-30 12:00 来源：未知作者：admin 阅读：次

In short:

Former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte has faced a senate inquiry in Manila looking into the killing of thousands of people under his war on drugs while leader.

He admitted to recruiting "gangsters" to kill other criminals while mayor of the city of Davao, but denied directing police to kill thousands of suspects while president.

What's next?

The International Criminal Court is continuing its investigation into the deaths of thousands during his crackdown on drugs.

Former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte has told a senate inquiry on Monday that he had maintained a "death squad" of gangsters to kill other criminals when he was mayor of a southern Philippine city.

Mr Duterte, however, denied authorising police to gun down thousands of suspects in a bloody crackdown on illegal drugs he had ordered as president and which is the subject of an investigation by the International Criminal Court as a possible crime against humanity.

The 79-year-old attended the televised inquiry in his first public appearance since his term ended in 2022. The senate is looking into the drug killings under Mr Duterte, which were unprecedented in their scale in recent Philippine history.

Mr Duterte acknowledged without elaborating that he once maintained a "death squad" of seven "gangsters" to deal with criminals when he was the longtime Davao city mayor, before he became president.

A number of relatives of people killed while Rodrigo Duterte was president testified during the hearing.

"I can make the confession now if you want," Mr Duterte said. "I had a death squad of seven, but they were not policemen, they were also gangsters."

"I'll ask a gangster to kill somebody," Mr Duterte said. "If you will not kill [that person], I will kill you now."

Senator Aquilino Pimentel III, who was overseeing the inquiry, and Senator Risa Hontiveros, pressed Mr Duterte to provide more details but the former president responded in unclear terms and said he would explain further in the next hearing.

Often swearing during the hearing, he said he would take full responsibility for the killings that happened while he was president from 2016 to 2022. But he said he never ordered his national police chiefs, who also attended the inquiry, to undertake extrajudicial killings.

"Did I ever tell you to kill any criminal?" he asked his former police chiefs. They included Ronald Dela Rosa, the current senator who first enforced Mr Duterte's campaign against illegal drugs as his national police chief.

"No, Mr president," Dela Rosa responded.

Aside from the International Criminal Court's ongoing investigation, there have been no known criminal complaints filed against Mr Duterte in Philippine courts over the killings.

"I'm puzzled why the Justice Department hasn't filed any case," he said.

"I've been killing people for a long time and they haven't filed any case up to now?"

The televised inquiry is Rodrigo Duterte's first public appearance since his term ended in 2022.

Former senator Leila de Lima, one of the most vocal critics of Mr Duterte who once investigated the drug killings in Davao, said there was adequate evidence and witnesses of the extrajudicial killings but they were scared of testifying against Mr Duterte when he was in power.

De Lima was arrested early on in Mr Duterte's presidency on drug charges that she said were fabricated to stop her from proceeding with her senate investigation. She was cleared of the charges and released from more than six years of detention last year.

"This man, the former mayor of Davao city and the former president of the Republic of the Philippines, for so long has evaded justice and accountability," said de Lima, sitting near the former president.

"We have not made him to account after all these years," she said, and added that witnesses could now surface and help prosecute Mr Duterte and his associates.

Rodrigo Duterte sounded defiant through the hearing.

"If I'm given another chance, I'll wipe all of you," he said of drug dealers and criminals, who he added had resumed their criminal actions after he stepped down from the presidency.

A priest comforts relatives as they receive the urns containing the remains of victims of alleged extrajudicial killings of president Rodrigo Duterte's so-called war on drugs.

The drug war has continued under Mr Duterte's successor, Ferdinand Marcos, though he has pushed for more emphasis on prevention and rehabilitation.

While the current and former president have had a bitter falling out, Mr Marcos has stressed his government will not cooperate with the ICC investigation.

The Philippines quit the ICC in 2019 on Mr Duterte's instructions, but the tribunal has said it has jurisdiction over killings before the pullout, as well as killings in the southern city of Davao when Mr Duterte was mayor there, years before he became president.

Activists regarded him as "a human rights calamity" not only for the widespread deaths under his so-called war on drugs but also for his brazen attacks on critical media, the dominant Catholic church and political opposition.

AP/AFP

By：ABC

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