Court spokesman says more charges maybe filed vs Duterte
INTERNATIONAL Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutors are investigating other personalities involved in the alleged extrajudicial killings related to the brutal drug crackdown of the administration of former president Rodrigo Duterte.
ICC spokesperson Fadi El Abdallah said any evidence collected by prosecutors will be presented to the judges for evaluation.
“The ICC prosecutor and his office are continuing to investigate and if they have sufficient evidence, they will present it to the judges, and the judges will decide whether to issue arrest warrants,” Abdallah said in an interview with TeleRadyo Serbisyo.
He, however, declined to provide additional details about the investigation, specifically the names who are being probed, citing confidentiality rules.
Former senator Antonio Trillanes IV has previously said that Sen. Ronald dela Rosa and retired PNP chief Oscar Albayalde are also being investigated for their roles in the drug killings.
Dela Rosa was Duterte’s first PNP chief when he assumed the presidency in 2016. He spearheaded the “Oplan Double Barrel” campaign and “Oplan Tokhang” project, a two-pronged approach to stop the continued proliferation of illegal drugs in the country.
Albayalde succeeded Dela Rosa when the latter resigned to run for the Senate in 2019 and continued the campaign.
Duterte, who was arrested on March 11 on the basis of an arrest warrant from the ICC, has been charged with murder as a crime against humanity over the deaths of thousands who were killed in pursuit of the drug campaign.
He is now detained at the Netherlands pending his trial, which will start on September 23.
Following Duterte’s arrest and turnover to the ICC, Dela Rosa said he is expecting the international court to issue a warrant for his arrest.
He has issued conflicting statements on what he plans to do when such a warrant is issued.
He initially said he would surrender and fly to The Hague so he can take care of the former president.
He later on said he would seek refuge at the Senate until he exhausts all legal remedies to oppose the warrant.
In recent interviews, he said he is planning to go into hiding to evade being arrested.
MORE CHARGES
Abdullah also said ICC prosecutors could pursue more charges against Duterte before his next court appearance in September.
He said this is one of the options available to the prosecutors.
“Whether the prosecutor wants to request again, present additional evidence or request other charges, it will have to be presented to the judges, and then the judges will decide on that,” he said.
He noted that prosecutors initially sought to indict the former president on three charges – murder, torture and rape as crimes against humanity.
However, the judges of the Pre-Trial Chamber 2 presided by Judge Iula Antoanella Motoc only issued a warrant of arrest against the former president for 43 murders committed from 2011 to 2019.
The other members of the chamber are Judges Reine Alipini Gansuo and Socorro Flores Liera.
The warrant said it found reasonable grounds to believe Duterte committed murder both as the founder of the notorious Davao Death Squad and as president of the Philippines.
‘IGNORANT’
Meanwhile, lawyer Joel Butuyan took a dig at the suggestion made by Duterte’s lead defense counsel, Nicholas Kaufman regarding the identification documents and legal representatives of drug war victims who will participate in the trial of the case in The Hague.
“Mr. Kaufman’s comment on the IDs of the victims comes from someone who obviously has no knowledge at all of the Philippine situation. It comes from someone who is totally ignorant of the kind of people who were mass murdered by his client, Mr. Duterte,” Butuyan said in a statement.
“For the information of Mr. Kaufman, the victims come from the poorest of the poor who do not have passports, driver’s license, SSS, GSIS, or any professional license,” he said.
Butuyan said identification documents being demanded by Kaufman are documents that are “badges of wealth and privilege in the Philippines” that are mostly unavailable to poor victims and who constitute the overwhelming number of the people killed in Duterte’s drug war.
“Mr. Kaufman is probably speaking from his experience as a British citizen who has a plethora of government-issued IDs because he comes from a wealthy country,” he said.
He also said that the victims’ families have already lost loved ones and for them to be refused recognition as victims because of their lack of government-issued IDs is to make them suffer grave injustice twice over.
Butuyan also rejected Kaufman’s suggestion that the Office of Public Counsel for Victims (OPCV) be appointed as legal representative for the victims.
“It is totally abhorrent that Mr. Duterte, speaking through Mr. Kaufman, wants his choice to be followed on who should stand as representative of the very people he mass murdered. No, Mr. Kaufman, the victims must have the say on who should speak for them, and not you who speaks for the mass murderer,” he said.
The ICC Registry earlier proposed that lawyers named or appointed by the victims participate on behalf of their clients while the OPCV represent the general interests of unrepresented applicants.
Kaufman objected to the proposal, saying it is unwieldy and might even cause a delay in the case.
The Pre-Trial Chamber has set the next hearing of Duterte’s case on September 23 this year to confirm the charges against him.
Duterte first appeared before the chamber on March 14.
