11th set of evidence vs Duterte turned in
The International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor has submitted the 11th batch of evidence in crimes against humanity case filed against former President Rodrigo Duterte.
In a document dated July 1, ICC Deputy Prosecutor Mame Mandiaye Niang disclosed to Duterte’s lawyers, as required by ICC rules, that it would utilize 1,062 more pieces of evidence against the former President under 10 itemized categories.
Duterte was indicted on crimes against humanity in 2025 over the extrajudicial killing of thousands of people, starting when he was mayor of Davao City until Philippines withdrew, during Duterte’s presidency, in 2019 from the Rome Statute that created the ICC.
Duterte has been the subject of complaints of human rights violations, by groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, since 2009.
During the general assembly of the Human Rights Council in April 2009, a report of the UN body said: “The Mayor of Davao City has done nothing to prevent these killings, and his public comments suggest that he is, in fact, supportive.”
The report also cited Duterte’s repeated public statements, even during his presidency, that he would help defend police officers who are charged for their “accomplishments” in the government’s anti-illegal drugs war, which both the Philippine National Police and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency acknowledged to have resulted in more than 6,000 killings.
The latest batch of evidence included items to prove Duterte’s links to the so-called Davao Death Squads (DDS), which Duterte supporters appropriated to now mean “Duterte Diehard Supporters.”
But most of the items in the list involved incidents in his six-year presidency, including barangay operations, indentified high-value targets, possible modes of liability and its contextual applications in the charges of crimes against humanity as well as possible lines of defense.
The new batch also included more than 300 items that could help lawyers in defending the former leader.
Duterte, who was arrested and expatriated in March, remains in detention at the ICC detention facility within the Scheveningen prison complex in The Hague, Netherlands.
The former president, a lawyer, had earlier sought the disqualification of two of the pre-trial chamber’s three judges on grounds of partiality: Reine Adélaïde Sophie Alapini-Gansou and María del Socorro Flores Liera, but a plenary session of ICC judges rejected the request in June.
Duterte’s daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte, said her father’s lawyers have asked the ICC to temporarily release the former leader to an undisclosed country because of humanitarian reasons and the 80-year-old former president posed no flight risk.
But the ICC prosecutor opposed the request because the proposed host country would not be able to implement the conditions of a possible interim release.
Belgium and Australia have publicly rejected the request, which is expected to be taken up when the ICC trial, which is currently in the pre-trial phase, moves to the confirmation of charges phase on Sept. 23.
