Rappler Talk: ICC probes Duterte’s drug war. What happens now?
President Rodrigo Duterte’s spokesperson, Harry Roque, is still confident about his principal’s chances at the International Criminal Court (ICC), saying on Thursday, September 16, that the investigation will never reach trial.
It will never reach trial if those involved evade the future warrants of arrest.
But who will be ordered arrested? It’s uncertain for now.
But the ICC’s pre-trial chamber strongly affirms the prosecution’s theory that under Duterte, there was a state policy to kill civilians, giving the court a reasonable basis to believe that crimes against humanity were committed in the Philippines.
The investigation will cover the alleged Davao Death Squad killings from 2011 to 2016 when Duterte was mayor and vice mayor in Davao City, and the nationwide killings under the war on drugs from 2016 to 2019. It stops at March 2019 because that’s when Philippines’ withdrawal from the Rome Statute became effective.
How much of a big deal is this, and is Malacañang just downplaying?
Rappler’s justice reporter Lian Buan talks to international lawyer Emerlynne Gil, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director for research.
Tune in at 6 pm Thursday, September 16. – Rappler.com