‘LAST HOPE’ | Victims ‘overwhelmingly support’ ICC probe on Duterte’s brutal drug war, says report

August 30, 2021 , 02:12 PM

By Beatrice Puente

(August 30, 2021) – Survivors and victims of the brutal drug war have expressed “overwhelming support” to launch an independent investigation into the controversial campaign of President Rodrigo Duterte, the International Criminal Court (ICC) Registry said in a report.

Some 212 representations were submitted to the ICC Registry which allows victims’ families to register their views about the proposed inquiry into the gruesome drug war. Only 204 were transmitted to the pre-trial chamber that accounts for 1,530 individuals and 1,050 families.

“The representations received overwhelmingly support the (prosecutor’s) request. They also bring forward the victims’ views and concerns regarding justice, the ICC, the potential scope of the investigation, and the impact of the so-called war on drugs on victims’ lives and their society,” said the report, which did not disclose the identities for privacy sake.

The majority of the victims’ families have pinned their hopes on the ICC to rule fairly on the crimes committed in the bloody drug war, citing the ineffectiveness of the country’s legal system in exacting justice.

Duterte and his cohorts have insisted on not cooperating with the ICC even if it can maintain jurisdiction over the killings that happened until 2019. Duterte stressed that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is already reviewing the cases despite the slow process.

But out of the thousands of incidents, only the case of 17-year-old Kian Loyd Delos Santos led to the murder conviction of three police officers who accused him of fighting back in a sting operation in Caloocan in 2017.

Many victims’ families and lawyers who sent their representations through the ICC Registry lamented the lack of due process that led to the killings, calling the international tribunal their “last hope.” One group feared that the human rights violations will continue if state authorities, including Duterte, will not be held accountable.

“Without the ICC, many of the families would choose not to pursue any form of justice. The prospect of an ICC investigation has rekindled their hopes of achieving justice and surfacing the truth,” one document was quoted in the report.

Apart from the killings, the victims also raised torture, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, attempted murder, and sexual violence as some of the other crimes carried out in the pitiless drug war. Many of the direct and indirect victims also incurred physical, psychological, material, and social harm.

They want these related crimes to be investigated, particularly the “palit-ulo” and “palit-puri” schemes, which further aggravated the situation. Many also hope that the proceedings will be efficient to bring to justice the powerful officials who have executed around 30,000 people nationwide.

“That’s the nightmare that never left my mind. Seeing all the dead people. I realized that all I said about supporting killing addicts was hurtful. I realized it hurts when you’re the one who has a loved one that becomes a victim,” said a victim’s relative.

(PM)

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