Philippine VP slams drug war

A daughter and sister of residents killed in an alleged drug operation by the police files a criminal case with her mother (not pictured) against the policemen involved in the operation, at a government court in Quezon city, Metro Manila, Philippines, on Tuesday. (Reuters)

MANILA: Philippine Vice President Leni Robredo said on Wednesday the nation’s drug war had left Filipinos feeling “hopeless and helpless,” with trust in the police eroded by thousands of summary executions.
In a video message to a UN meeting on extrajudicial killings posted online, Robredo also called for international scrutiny on President Rodrigo Duterte’s controversial crackdown.
“Some of those who have told us that when there’s crime, they normally go to the police. Now, they don’t know where to turn,” Robredo said in the message, which was released to press ahead of its screening at the UN meeting in Austria on Thursday.
“Our people feel both hopeless and helpless: A state of mind that we must all take seriously.”
Duterte won presidential elections last year after promising to eradicate illegal drugs in society with an unprecedented crackdown in which tens of thousands of people would die. But the vice president is elected separately in the Philippines, and Robredo belongs to a rival political party.
Since Duterte took office at the end of June, police have reported killing 2,500 people in anti-drug operations while about 4,500 others have died in unexplained circumstances. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have warned Duterte may be overseeing crimes against humanity, with state sanctioned killings.
Duterte and his police chiefs have insisted security forces are not breaking any laws.
They have said nearly all of those killed by police were in self-defense while the unexplained deaths were likely due to drug gangs eliminating rivals or others who could implicate them.
In her message to the UN, Robredo described all those deaths as “summary executions.”
“We are now looking at some very grim statistics: Since July last year, more than 7,000 people have been killed in summary executions,” Robredo said.
Robredo also said police were detaining innocent people in a scheme known as “exchange heads.”
In this, if police officers could not find a drug suspect, they would detain one of his or her relatives instead, according to Robredo.
While Duterte has repeatedly railed against international human rights groups and other foreign critics of his drug war, Robredo invited more scrutiny.
“To know that the international community’s eyes are on us and to feel that human rights advocates are watching over our country gives us comfort, courage, and hope,” she said.
Robredo’s relationship with Duterte is frosty and since being disinvited from his Cabinet meetings, they meet rarely and only during public events.
She belongs to another political party and was not Duterte’s choice for vice president, who is elected in a separate contest. A social activist and lawyer, Robredo said the public should demand greater transparency about the drugs war and questioned Duterte’s figures on drug use.
Duterte sacked Robredo from his Cabinet in December after she started speaking out against his drug war and some of his other policies. Her comments to the UN meeting are among her strongest criticisms of Duterte.The vice president of the Philippines has issued a strong rebuke of President Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody war on drugs, describing it in a video sent to the United Nations as an issue of public health that cannot be solved “with bullets alone”.
More than 8,000 people have died since Duterte began his war on drugs when he took office on June 30. More than 2,500 were killed in police operations during which officers said they fired in self-defence.
Human rights groups say thousands of other deaths of drug users and peddlers are extrajudicial killings, probably ordered by police. Police strongly reject that.
In a message to be shown on Thursday at the annual meeting of the U.N. Commission on Drugs in Geneva, Leni Robredo challenged Duterte’s crackdown, describing the killings as “summary executions”. Filipinos were “hopeless and helpless”, she added.
“The body count due to the drug-related killings keeps growing,” Robredo said in the video statement uploaded on YouTube.
“We are now looking at some very grim statistics: since July last year, more than 7,000 people have been killed in summary executions. Our people need nothing less than a safe environment.”
The government has made no immediate comment on the video.
Robredo has emerged as one of a few high-profile Filipinos willing to speak out against the war on drugs.
Many of its domestic critics have been ridiculed and are routinely discredited by Duterte and his aides, some subject to fierce barbs from the president’s huge online support base. Duterte himself has vowed to humiliate foreign leaders who challenge him over the campaign.
Duterte has recently described 4 million Filipinos as “slaves” to drugs.
“Our leaders must be honest about the basis of the drug war and what exactly is the scope of the drug problem,” she said, adding that the problem was linked with poverty and inequality.
Robredo detailed a litany of alleged human rights abuses during the crackdown on what she said were predominantly poor communities.
“People are told they do not have any right to demand search warrants as they are squatters,” she said in the video.
Robredo accused police of using a tactic of detaining the loved ones of drug suspects if they cannot find their targets.
Police spokesman Dionardo Carlos rebutted that contention during a television interview on Wednesday.