Philippine bishop and ex-ICC judge lead new inquiry into thousands of Duterte-era killings

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A group led by a Roman Catholic bishop in the Philippines launched a fact-finding body Wednesday to document accounts of witnesses and other details of ex-President Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody anti-drugs crackdown that the government can use to prosecute law enforcers.

Duterte, who ended his stormy six-year presidency in 2022, was arrested last year and taken to the Netherlands, where he is facing trial before the International Criminal Court in The Hague for alleged crimes against humanity over the killings.

Sen. Ronald dela Rosa, Duterte’s loyal ally and his former national police chief, who first enforced the bloody crackdown, is wanted by the ICC as a co-perpetrator for some of the thousands of killings, which alarmed Western governments and human rights groups.

Dela Rosa has gone into hiding and is being hunted by Philippine authorities, who have vowed to enforce an ICC warrant for his arrest and turn him over to the global court.

Dela Rosa and the brash-speaking Duterte have denied authorizing extrajudicial killings, but the then president had repeatedly threatened suspects with death.

Many of the thousands of police officers directly involved in the brutal crackdown that left thousands of mostly poor suspects dead have not been thoroughly investigated, and very few have been convicted, according to human rights groups.

“This is long overdue,” Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David said in a news conference. The nongovernment “EJK Truth Commission” he helped organize will focus on helping victims, their families and even repentant law enforcers to finally find closure, David said.

“This is an opportunity for a catharsis … so we can recover our dignity as a country,” David said. “Ultimately, what we aspire for is healing not only for the victims but also our institutions.”

Raul Pangalangan, a respected Philippine lawyer, who has served for years as an ICC judge, said the commission he will head “was created to ensure that the stories of victims, survivors and families are heard, verified and preserved.”

The commission plans to hold public hearings.

“These things happened because everybody looked the other way,” Pangalangan said. “It is almost a conspiracy of silence.”

Members of the commission said they will allow the government to use their findings to help authorities investigate, prosecute and seek accountability. Their periodic reports may be submitted to justice and human rights officials, they said.

David called on civil society, academic, religious and other groups to help the commission and said a large charity group in Germany has offered funding support.

Commission member Raquel Fortun, a forensic pathologist with the state-run University of the Philippines, told The Associated Press that the task of establishing facts years after the killings would be difficult. There were efforts by some law enforcers involved in the killings to evade accountability.

Death certificates of 13 drug suspects, whose remains were exhumed after Duterte stepped down from office, stated they died of natural causes, like heart attack and pneumonia, she said.

“When I examined the remains, I found that they were hit by gunfire,” Fortun said.