ICC asked: Free Duterte while assessing health
The camp of former President Rodrigo Duterte has again asked the pretrial chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to release the former leader even as he awaits the court’s decision on whether he is fit to face trial on the charge of crimes against humanity for which he was arrested in March.
Duterte was scheduled to undergo a confirmation of charges proceeding on Sept. 23, but the chamber postponed it after the former president’s lawyers argued that he was unfit to face trial because of his alleged cognitive deficiencies, a matter the court said it would determine later.
In a document filed on Sept. 16, Duterte’s lawyers again pleaded for his immediate release or transfer to an unnamed country.
“Mr. Duterte should not remain in detention while proceedings on fitness—now expected to take no less than [redacted] at a minimum—are underway,” they said in their latest “notification” to the court. “Administrative delay, occasioned by [redacted], cannot justify the abrogation of liberty. Provisional release should be ordered as soon as continuing detention ceases to be reasonable,” they added.
On the same day, the defense also disclosed for the first time the initial set of evidence it would use in Duterte’s crimes against humanity case.
Defense submits evidence
The defense camp said it turned over to the Office of the Prosecutor and the Office of Public Counsel for Victims at least 30 pieces of evidence, 29 of which were submitted on Sept. 5, while only one item was submitted on Sept. 11. But the nature and details of the evidence were classified confidential.
Speaking to reporters in Davao City, Vice President Sara Duterte said her father seemed “okay” although she expressed concern that the rigors of incarceration even in the modern ICC facilities of The Hague were causing him mental issues like shifting moods and frustration.
“I am comforted by the fact that there is someone who can visit him, with permission from the [ICC] detention unit, every day,” she said in an interview at the sidelines of the Davao Agri-Trade Expo and the 8th Davao Investment Conference.
“But I have been thinking about visiting him too, since I noticed there were changes in his mood lately,” she added.
The vice president said she had asked her younger sister, Veronica “Kitty” Duterte, about the situation of their father “since there were no calls.”
Ex-leader frustrated
“And President Duterte was even saying that he does not want to feel this frustration that he can’t do anything about [his situation],” she said.
She said she last spoke with her father after she appeared in a budget hearing at the House of Representatives on Tuesday, adding that they talked about politics, the government’s flood control projects and even his personal romantic life.
“It is difficult to speak just over the telephone, since the lines were unclear, and we couldn’t hear each other properly,” Sara Duterte said. “You can’t comfort someone you’re just talking to [over the phone].”
The vice president previously said she would return to the Hague during the confirmation of charges hearing after a trip to Japan next week, but that was before the ICC pretrial chamber postponed the hearing until after it takes up the former president’s “cognitive deficiencies.”
The chamber’s Presiding Judge Iulia Motoc and Judge Reine Adelaide Alapini-Gansou decided in favor of the defense, but the third judge, Maria del Socorro Flores Liera, dissented, stressing that the hearings should have proceeded as scheduled because the assessment of whether Duterte, or any individual charged, is physically able to appear in court is “exclusively within the competence of the trial chamber.”
The confirmation of charges hearings, which are part of the pretrial proceedings, will determine whether there is sufficient basis to believe that the former president may have committed the alleged crimes and, therefore, will have to face trial.
