ICC names Dela Rosa, Aguirre in raps vs Du30
Prosecutors of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, the Netherlands, mentioned Sen. Ronald dela Rosa and former Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II in the “pre-confirmation brief” explaining the specific charges against detained former President Rodrigo Duterte.
The heavily redacted 78-page briefer did not specifically mention their first names, but they were the only so-named officials in the Duterte administration at that time.
The briefer explained that Duterte is facing three counts of murder and attempted murder as crimes against humanity for making “essential contributions” to 49 incidents of killings when he was Davao City mayor and Philippine president.
The briefer is actually the redacted version of the “Document Containing the Charges” dated July 4 that was supposed to have been submitted to the ICC on Sept. 23 for the hearing on the confirmation of charges against Duterte. The hearing, however, has been postponed while the ICC determines if he is fit to stand trial.
The document, signed by ICC Deputy Prosecutor Mame Mandiaye Niang, said that the 49 cases do not reflect “the actual scale of victimization during the charged period, which was significantly greater, as reflected in the widespread nature of the attack.”
Lawyer Kristina Conti, one of the lawyers who brought the case to the ICC, said that the mere mention of the two key figures in the Duterte administration’s ruthless policy against illegal drugs was an indication of their “clear involvement” in the killings.
“The briefer indeed mentions the key role of Dela Rosa. And for me, it is clear that it lays out Dela Rosa as a co-perpetrator alongside Duterte,” Konti said.
As chief of the Philippine National Police, Dela Rosa implemented Duterte’s drug war that left over 6,000 suspects dead, according to government records.
According to the briefer, Dela Rosa made a promise, weeks before Duterte was to assume office, to “immediately scale up” the Davao model of the drug war with the threat of: “If someone fights back, they’ll die. If nobody fights back, we’ll make them fight back.”
The briefer said it was Dela Rosa who signed Command Memorandum Circular No. 16-2016 that outlined Project “Double Barrel,” formally launching the anti-illegal drugs campaign nationwide in “express pursuance” of Duterte’s campaign promises.
With this new policy under his watch, Dela Rosa told Philippine media, as quoted by the court in the document: “Killings in the name of drugs. This is really about killings in the name of drugs. So you drug lords out there, get ready because I’ll crush you.”
Aguirre, on the other hand, reflected Dela Rosa’s remarks and “said the new administration’s ‘programme’ was ‘to do everything to stop drugs, crimes, and corruption’—‘we will choose to kill these drug lords.’”
The former justice secretary, however, has denied uttering the quote attributed by the ICC prosecutors to him.
Welfare check defended
Both the ICC and the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), meanwhile, disputed the claim of Vice President Sara Duterte that Philippine Embassy officials in The Hague “abused” visitation rules when they checked in on her father at the ICC’s detention facility.
In an email sent to the Inquirer on Wednesday, ICC spokesperson Fadi El Abdallah said that any visit made to a person being held at the ICC prison facility is “strictly conducted with the approval or at the request of the person in detention.”
This, Abdallah noted, is in line with the Rome Statute and the international standards of granting detained persons access to consular services.
On the claims made by the vice president that the consular visits were “sham welfare checks” that endanger the safety of the former president, Abdallah said: “We cannot comment on matters related to [the] private situation of a detained person.”
The DFA, for its part, confirmed that embassy officials conducted a “welfare check” on the elder Duterte, but stressed that this was standard procedure accorded to Filipinos who are detained overseas.
“This is in line with its functions under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations and relevant Philippine laws to protect the welfare of all Filipinos,” it said in a statement sent to reporters.
“This is a duty of all Philippine foreign service posts and is no different from what the DFA does for other Filipino citizens who are in detention abroad,” it added.
