The Palace on Tuesday cried foul over an editorial piece by US daily The New York Times calling on Manila’s trade partners to hit the government “where it may hurt the most”—by suspending trade incentives and impose tariffs on Philippine goods.
“It’s beyond the scope of the NYT to be able to make comments like that,” Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella said.
Abella insisted that some individuals, including politicians, had paid the US-based publication to carry out its “demolition work” against the President.
“It seems to be orchestrated … who would benefit from that? Who has rational links, I would not speculate on that, but somebody would be benefitting in that situation,” he added.
In an editorial piece titled “Accountability for Duterte,” the newspaper urged Manila’s trading partners to follow the European Union’s example of threatening to revoke trade privileges to hold Duterte accountable for his alleged support of the killings in his war against drugs.
But in a statement, Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said the “editorial calling for trade sanctions against the Philippines is baseless and unfair.”
Echoing the Palace’s sentiments, Lopez said that “there are no extrajudicial killings and human rights are not being violated in the government’s campaign to cleanse the country of drug elements. The government does not sanction the killings that are occurring, mainly due to actions by criminals and drug syndicates to purge their ranks. While some drug elements have been killed during police operations, this is a result of the criminals fighting back with force and leaving our police force with no recourse but to protect themselves.”
Lopez also noted that the number of deaths reported, many of these are categorized by the Philippine National Police as Deaths Under Investigation, or deaths that don’t involve police operations. The government does not condone these.
“That’s why we believe the accusations made by the US broadsheet is based on unverified media reports, and is creating a general perception that there are extrajudicial killings taking place in the country. There is no such thing in the country.”
The Trade secretary said that the Philippines “is verging on an economic breakout, pointing out that business confidence is high, with investor confidence more than 34 percent.
“The confidence is there, as evidenced by the record high foreign direct investments at $7.9Bn in 2016 or 44 percent higher than previous year. The Board of Investments also reported a 21 percent hike in registered investments, and the foreign investments part of it during the second half of 2016 [under Duterte administration] posted much higher growth rate versus previous semester and versus same period in 2015 indicative of the foreign investors’ confidence in the Philippines and how conducive the business environment is in the country.”
He ended his statement by saying that “any form of trade sanction against the Philippines is uncalled for, unfounded, and undeserved.”