{"id":278870,"date":"2020-12-17T02:18:56","date_gmt":"2020-12-17T07:18:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=278870"},"modified":"2020-12-17T02:18:56","modified_gmt":"2020-12-17T07:18:56","slug":"duterte-says-hes-not-afraid-of-icc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/12\/17\/duterte-says-hes-not-afraid-of-icc\/","title":{"rendered":"Duterte says he’s not afraid of ICC"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
President Rodrigo Roa Duterte talks to the people after holding a meeting with the Inter-Agency Task Force on the Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) core members at the Arcadia Active Lifestyle Center in Davao City on November 23, 2020. ARMAN BAYLON\/ PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte on Wednesday night said he is not afraid of suffering the consequences of his administration’s anti-illegal drugs campaign, saying his administration is just doing what is right for the greater good.<\/p>\n

Duterte rejected the remark made by former Senator Antonio Trillanes IV that he must be “trembling in fear” after International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Fatou Bensouda’s office released a report saying there was “reasonable basis” to believe that he and his subordinates committed crimes against humanity in the drug war.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Yang kay Trillanes, may ano siya statement. Natatakot daw ako. Hindi ako natatakot<\/em>\u00a0(Trillanes has a statement. He says I\u2019m afraid. I\u2019m not afraid),\u201d he said in a late night public address.<\/p>\n

He said he was ready to stand by his principles, insisting that his administration\u2019s crackdown on the illegal narcotics trade is for the greater good.<\/p>\n

\u201cAko, magpakamatay ako sa prinsipyo ko. Kung iyang prinsipyo ko na \u2018yan ikamatay ko, okay ‘yan sa akin. Ipakulong ako habangbuhay, okay sa akin ‘yan. Ginagawa ko ang tama<\/em>\u00a0(I will die for my principles. If those principles will be the death of me, it\u2019s fine by me. If I\u2019m sentenced to life imprisonment, it\u2019s fine as long as I did what was right),\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

While the ICC was looking into drug-related killings, Duterte emphasized that police officers were also casualties in the war on drugs.<\/p>\n

He brought this up while reiterating his desire to bring back the use of \u201cbatuta\u2019\u2019 (cudgel) among law enforcers.<\/p>\n

Duterte admitted that there were a few bad cops who are trigger happy and do not hesitate to shoot drug suspects.<\/p>\n

However, he said that he never ordered state forces to shoot or kill anyone unless it was an act of self-defense.<\/p>\n

\u201cMay mga pulis na talagang may ano sa — diretso salvage ganoon. Wala akong inutos na ganoon<\/em>\u00a0(Some cops go straight to killing. I never ordered that). Remember, in all of my utterances, ang galit ko \u2018yan (when I\u2019m angry) when I say, \u2018Do not destroy my country, the Republic of the Philippines, who elected me as President. Do not destroy our sons and daughters because I will kill you.\u2019\u00a0Hindi ko sinabi<\/em>\u00a0(I didn\u2019t say), \u2018They impede, they will kill you.\u2019 The military will\u2026 I said, \u2018I will kill you.\u00a0Wala akong pinatay na tao<\/em>\u00a0(I didn\u2019t kill anyone),\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Duterte also renewed his commitment to support law enforcers charged with killing while in the line of duty.<\/p>\n

\u201cSabi ko, ito<\/em>\u00a0(I said), \u2018Go out and destroy the apparatus.\u2019\u00a0Iyan. Pagka nagkabarilan diyan<\/em>\u00a0(If you end up shooting each other) in destroying the apparatus, goodbye\u00a0ka<\/em>\u00a0(that\u2019s goodbye).\u00a0Kaya sabi ko, \u2018Ako<\/em>\u00a0(That\u2019s why I said \u2018Me), I take full responsibility for my order.\u2019 But remember, I said, \u2018enforce the law in accordance with what you have learned then self-defense,\u2019\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Duterte also questioned Trillanes’ intelligence, asking him why he wasn’t elected as President if he felt he could do better than him.<\/p>\n

“Trillanes,\u00a0kung<\/em>\u00a0bright\u00a0ka sa akin, kung mas marunong ka, ikaw na sana ang nagdadaldal dito, hindi ako. Iyan ang totoo<\/em>\u00a0(Trillanes, if you’re brighter than me, if you’re better, you should be talking here, not me. That’s the truth),” he said.<\/p>\n

According to Duterte, members of the opposition were trying so hard to regain power by destroying his reputation.<\/p>\n

\u201cPainting the other guy black so that you would appear white.\u00a0Iyan ang ginagawa nila. Pinipinturahan kami ng itim para bumango sila, maputi sila<\/em>\u00a0(That\u2019s what they\u2019re doing. They\u2019re painting us black so they look good, they\u2019re white),\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Earlier, Malaca\u00f1ang expressed confidence that ICC judges will eventually decide against opening a preliminary investigation into the drug war.<\/p>\n

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque cited the principle of complementarity in which the ICC can only investigate crimes against humanity if local courts are unable or unwilling to do so.\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte on Wednesday night said he is not afraid of suffering the consequences of his administration’s anti-illegal …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":277350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-278870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278870"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278870\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":278872,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278870\/revisions\/278872"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}