THE United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights scored President Rodrigo Duterte’s apparent “lack of respect for due process rights,” citing his repeated pronouncements condoning the killing of drug suspects who resist arrest.
“In the Philippines, I continue to be gravely concerned by the President’s open support for a shoot-to-kill policy regarding suspects, as well as by the apparent absence of credible investigations into reports of thousands of extrajudicial killings, and the failure to prosecute any perpetrator,” Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said during the 36th session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva Monday.
The UN statement came as the Catholic Church issued its strongest statement to date against the extrajudicial killings that have marred Duterte’s war on illegal drugs.
“In the name of God, stop the killings! May the justice of God come upon those responsible for the killings!” Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) president and Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas said in a statement signed on behalf of the bishops.
Like the Catholic Church, the UN official cited the case of Grade 11 student Kian Loyd delos Santos, who was beaten and shot dead by the policemen who claimed he fired on them first.
Zeid described as “appalling” the response from the authorities, particularly Duterte and Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II, who initially sought to play it down as “an isolated case.”
“However, suspicion of extrajudicial killings has now become so widespread that the initials EJK have reportedly become a verb in some communities – as in ‘he was EJKed.’ Two days after hundreds of people turned out for the teenager’s funeral, the President again told police they would not be punished for killing suspects who resist arrest,” Zeid said.
“This lack of respect for the due process rights of all Filipinos is appalling,” the UN official added.
The top human rights official also expressed “shock” at Duterte’s threat to bomb schools for indigenous children or the lumad in Mindanao, which he said were teaching children to rebel against the government.
Zeid expressed concern over Duterte’s orders for the police to shoot any human rights workers who “are part of the drug trade” or who obstruct justice.
“Many human rights defenders who are the honor of their country face a growing number of death threats, and I call on the government to ensure they are accorded full protection and the right to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly without reprisals,” Zeid said.
He added that any move to reintroduce the death penalty would be another step back for the country.
“I urge the government to uphold the Philippines’ international human rights obligations, amid deeper reflection about the values that the Philippines stands for,” he said.
Presidential spokesman Ernesto Abella took issue with Zeid’s “sweeping statements,” saying some of them were “bereft of factual basis.”
He added that contrary to Zeid’s statement, the President has repeatedly said there is no shoot-to-kill order.
“All drug killings are subject to investigations,” Abella said.
He also said Zeid took the threat to bomb lumad schools out of context, saying “it would be better” to focus on the Duterte administration’s efforts to educate the lumad.
“The objective of the President’s campaign against illegal drugs is to preserve the lives of the Filipino people, to prevent the destruction of Filipino families, and to protect the Philippines from becoming a narco-state,” Abella said.
Villegas, for his part, called for an end to “the reign of terror.”
“For the good of the country, stop the killings! The toll of ‘murders under investigation’ must stop now,” Villegas said.
“For the sake of the children and the poor, stop their systematic murders and spreading reign of terror! In memory of those killed, let us start the healing of our bleeding nation,” he added.
The CBCP cited the deaths of Delos Santos and 19-year-old Carl Angelo Arnaiz at the hands of Caloocan City police, as well as the killing of a 14-year-old boy, whose body was found floating in a creek with 30 stab wounds.
Villegas said labeling drug addicts as “hopelessly perverse” or “irreparably damaged” made it easier for the public to consent to their elimination, “if not participate outright in their murder.”
“We stand firmly against drugs and the death drugs have caused, but killing is not the solution of the problem,” he added.
In the Senate, the committee on public order and illegal drugs summoned a 21-year-old eyewitness to the killing of Arnaiz last month.
Committee chairman Senator Panfilo Lacson said the witness informed him that he saw Arnaiz before he was shot dead, and that he had seen him with another companion aboard a police car that passed right in front of him.
Lacson’s committee is investigating the recent killing of minors, including that of Delos Santos.
The hearing was reset to Sept. 19 next after Monday’s hearing was postponed due to a typhoon.
Lacson said the witness saw Arnaiz alive, and even directly looked him in the eye as the police car drove by.
The witness said the place was well lit and Arnaiz even looked directly at him.
“Apparently after the incident, the so-called eyewitness had a recurring dream during which the chance sighting would repeat itself, ending with him hearing the gunshot that killed the former UP-Diliman student,” said Lacson.
It was this recurring dream that pushed him to finally come forward and say his piece, share what he knew of the moments before Arnaiz’s killing, Lacson said.
Lacson said the witness also identified the two cops who were with Arnaiz before he died.
Police claim they killed Arnaiz in a shootout after he robbed a taxi driver.
But the driver, Tomas Bagcal, said Arnaiz was cornered by some tricycle drivers who beat him, then later taken alive to the nearest police station.
Bagcal also denied executing an affidavit on the robbery, directly contradicting what the police had said.