The Office of the Prosecutor has formally submitted the “Document Containing Charges” or DCC against former President Rodrigo Duterte, ICC-accredited lawyer Gilbert Andres said in a radio interview Saturday.
“This is the formal filing of specific charges against Mr. Duterte. We will now know the extent of the crimes charged against Mr. Duterte,” Andres told dzMM.
He said specific charges could include allegations of gender-based violence, illegal imprisonment, and torture, among other inhuman acts during the Duterte administration’s bloody war on illegal drugs.
“This (DCC) will define the evidence that the prosecution must present during the confirmation of charges on September 23,” Andres added.
Earlier this week, the ICC denied the request filed by Duterte’s lawyers seeking to disqualify two judges from hearing the case against him.
In a decision dated July 3, the plenary of judges said it found no grounds to doubt the impartiality of Judges Reine Adélaïde Sophie Alapini-Gansou and María del Socorro Flores Liera.
The ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor, for its part, submitted the 11th batch of evidence against Duterte for his crimes against humanity case in connection with his “drug war.”
Based on a document dated July 1, the prosecution team presented over a thousand pieces of new evidence to ICC, including information on the killings allegedly committed by the “Davao Death Squad” during Duterte’s term as Davao City mayor, and the killings in barangay clearance operations during his presidential term.
As this developed, Duterte’s former wife, Elizabeth Zimmerman, in an account relayed by former presidential spokesman Harry Roque in a Facebook post, said the former president was “okay” but has become “skin and bones.”
“He is okay, but he is so thin. Skin and bones,” Roque quoted Zimmerman as saying.