CATHOLIC bishops on Sunday led thousands of worshippers in calling for an end to killings in President Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs as they urged police and troops to stop the violence.
The killing of three teenagers in August triggered rare public protests against Duterte’s anti-drugs campaign, with rights groups accusing him of committing crimes against humanity in a crackdown that has claimed thousands of lives.
The Catholic Church, which counts 80 percent of Filipinos as followers, has been one of the leading critics of the war on drugs and has launched campaigns to stop the killings, including one starting on Sunday dubbed “Heal Our Land.”
The church organized a mass and procession along Edsa.
About 3,000 people—including opposition lawmakers, students and church groups—joined the event, according to police. They carried candles and placards reading, “Stop the Killings. Start the Healing.”
“Peace to you in the armed forces and the police. Stop the violence and uphold the law,” Archbishop Socrates Villegas, the president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, said at the mass.
“If we do not stop the killings, there will be a punishment for a nation that kills its own people.”
Duterte, 72, won elections last year after campaigning on a law-and-order platform and since then police have reported killing more than 3,900 drug suspects.
Duterte’s spokesman on Sunday said he did not condone extrajudicial killings, adding the government was investigating another 2,243 deaths in unsolved “drug-related” cases.
“The President himself made a clear stance that any violation committed by the police during operations would be dealt with accordingly,” Harry Roque said.
Critics say that Duterte’s frequent public pronouncements on the drug war have been direct incitements to kill.
Villegas said the killings tested the nation and cited the case of 17-year-old student Kian delos Santos, who died in a police anti-drug raid in August.
“Please stop. I still have a test tomorrow,” Villegas quoted Delos Santos as saying following witness accounts that he had begged for his life.
Malacañang on Sunday said it wants to build a better relationship with the Catholic Church.
“We wish to build better rapport with the Catholic Church and seek the cooperation of its leaders, even as we call on our Catholic brethren to pro-actively help government in our anti-illegal drug campaign, particularly in the rehabilitation and treatment of drug dependents.”
“We are one in the true healing of this nation that has long been divided by politics,” Roque said.
“We must come together as one country and one people and help the government in building a nation free from drugs, criminality and corruption,” said Roque.
On the other hand, Roque said that the administration will not or ever condone extrajudicial and vigilante killings.
Roque said he does not see the prayer rally as a show of anti-government groups.
“No. In fact if I had no flight to Cebu later, for a meeting with the provincial press corps, I would join them,” he said.
Roque also said he did not know where Rep. Neri Colmenares got the idea that extrajudicial killings were state-sponsored.
