‘US Senate resolution has no effect on De Lima case’

MANILA, Philippines — Recent moves in the US Senate to ban the entry of Philippine officials reportedly responsible for the detention of Sen. Leila de Lima would not have any effect on the pending criminal cases against her, Senate President Vicente Sotto III said yesterday.

Sotto stressed that he was not taking sides for or against De Lima, but his issue was with some US senators who are interfering in the internal affairs of the country.

“They’re (US senators) free to do what they want, say what they want but they cannot meddle in our internal affairs. There should be no implication at all (to de Lima’s case) and the answer to them should be ‘so what?’” Sotto told radio dwIZ.

He said the country’s justice system is fully functioning and is no longer a colony of America.

The US Senate earlier passed Resolution 142 seeking sanctions against Philippine officials involved in De Lima’s detention and in extrajudicial killings in the conduct of the Duterte administration’s war on drugs.

The resolution, authored by Sen. Edward Markey of Massachusetts, called on US President Donald Trump to impose sanctions against concerned Philippine officials pursuant to the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act.

The Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act allows the US government to impose sanctions on foreign government officials implicated in human rights abuses in any part of the world.

The US government’s 2020 budget signed last year also included a provision authorizing the US Secretary of State to deny entry to any Philippine official responsible for De Lima’s detention.

De Lima was detained in February 2017 on charges that she allowed the illegal drug trade in the New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa City when she was justice secretary during the administration of former president Benigno Aquino III.

Sotto said the resolution was tantamount to being a bill of attainder, which is banned by the US Constitution.

He described a bill of attainder is an act of a legislature punishing a person or a group of people for alleged crimes without the benefit of a trial.