MANILA, Philippines — President Duterte has once again come out swinging at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for looking into complaints against purported human rights abuses under his administration.
In remarks before Cebu gastroenterologists, Duterte criticized anew the ICC, which he may have mistaken for the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
“Well, the one thing is about my ICC – International Court of Justice. I had your all b******,” he said.
“They want to send me to prison and try me for genocide. They’re a bunch of criminals,” the Chief Executive said, adding that those killed in the drug war were actual criminals and not members of a particular race.
Duterte expressed his sentiments on the 46th anniversary of the declaration of martial law on Friday, as thousands held rallies in Metro Manila and other urban centers to commemorate what they considered as one of the darkest episodes in the country’s history and warned the public of an emerging dictatorship.
Duterte said there was no evidence to prove that his war on drugs alone was to blame for the thousands of deaths since he assumed office two years ago.
“They cannot even show me how they died? When did they die? Where? Nothing,” Duterte said. “Me killing 4,000? I won’t have even a time to sit for a s***, if that is the case. It will keep me busy 24 hours,” he added.
He again lashed out at the European Union, which had also called on him to put a stop to human rights abuses committed in the conduct of his war on drugs.
Duterte slammed the body for trying “to impose their values and the way they think how criminal is categorized and classified and want to impose it.”
“Who are you to run my country? That’s the problem with the European Union. They are into international governing. They create an ICC, European community,” he said.
“It’s a neo-colonialism,” he added.
At the same time, Duterte praised the move of US national security adviser John Bolton to question ICC’s plan to investigate the US troops’ possible abuses in Afghanistan. “And I think Bolton was right, he got… He attacked the… (ICC),” Duterte said.
He boasted that he was the first to challenge the ICC and even the US during the Obama administration.
“But before that I was one, I said… I got me a quarrel with Obama. Obama was… Now, now that he is done and you review his actuation, more of a communist or a leftist,” he said.
In a related development, chief presidential legal counsel Salvador Panelo described as futile any attempt by detractors to bring Duterte before the so-called International People’s Tribunal.
“Another vulnerable foreign organization has been used as a tool by the skeptics of the President in a futile attempt to destroy his image and repute both in the international and local communities,” Panelo said.
“It is apparent that the decision of the International People’s Tribunal finding the President liable for concocted violations of human rights resulted from a one-sided and shallow study of the country’s current situation,” he added.
Panelo said the “decision” should “be treated as nothing but a piece of political litter.”
The President’s chief legal adviser noted that the organization had also prejudged former president and incumbent Speaker Gloria Arroyo, whom the tribunal found guilty of human rights violations in 2005.
Panelo noted that it was the “same kangaroo court” which in 2015 also declared former president Benigno Aquino III and former US president Barack Obama guilty of gross and systematic violations of human rights.
“Given these, it is difficult to dismiss the strong probability that this manipulative practice by personalities from the left is being undertaken as another leverage to succumb to their blue-sky demands,” he said.
Panelo urged Duterte’s critics to seek redress from local courts if they believe the administration’s campaign against criminality, terrorists or rebel groups has indeed left a trail of rights abuses.
He stressed that local courts are more cognizant of the country’s current state of affairs.
“As for the government, it shall maintain its serious efforts in executing the law equally but harshly against those who violate it, regardless of social status or political color,” Panelo said.
“It shall as well continue its support in favor of its officers and personnel with a qualification that they should perform their duties in strict abidance of our laws,” he said.