Credit: AP
Former Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte was detained on Tuesday after the government said it received an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant in connection with a case of crime against humanity filed against him.
Duterte, 79, was arrested after arriving at Manila's international airport from Hong Kong amid chaotic scenes.
Police took him into custody on orders of the ICC, which has been investigating Duterte's brutal anti-drugs crackdown during his time in office that killed more than 6,000 people based on police data.
In a statement, President Ferdinand Marcos' office said: "Upon his (Duterte's) arrival, the Prosecutor General filed an ICC notification for an arrest warrant against the former President for crimes against humanity," adding that Duterte is currently in the custody of authorities.
Duterte questioned the basis for the warrant, saying in a video posted online by his daughter: "What is the law and what is the crime that I committed?"
The surprise arrest sparked a commotion at the airport, where lawyers and aides of Duterte loudly protested that they, along with a doctor and lawyers, were prevented from coming close to him after he was taken into police custody. "This is a violation of his constitutional right," Sen. Bong Go, a close Duterte ally. told reporters.
'Systematic attack on victims'
A copy of the ICC arrest warrant, which was seen by The AP, said "there are reasonable grounds to believe that" the attack on victims "was both widespread and systematic: the attack took place over a period of several years and thousands people appear to have been killed."
Duterte's arrest was necessary "to ensure his appearance before the court," according to the March 7 warrant, adding that the former president was expected to ignore a court summons.
It said that although Duterte was no longer president, he "appears to continue to wield considerable power."
"Mindful of the resultant risk of interference with the investigations and the security of witnesses and victims, the chamber is satisfied that the arrest of Mr. Duterte is necessary."
There was no immediate comment on Duterte's arrest from the court or the ICC prosecutor's office.
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Duterte's war on drugs
Before becoming president, Duterte laid the groundwork for his bloody war on drugs that pitted police armed with impunity against drug users, small-time dealers and kingpins.
As mayor of Davao City, a metropolis of 1.5 million people on the southern island of Mindanao, Duterte built a national reputation over two decades for his no-nonsense approach to crime.
But along with this reputation came allegations that he was connected to extrajudicial killings by a well-coordinated group of vigilantes.
Duterte then swept to power in 2016 on a promise to wage war against drugs and drug pushers in the Southeast Asian nation.
The ensuing brutal crackdown killed thousands – many of the victims were young men from impoverished shanty towns, shot by police and rogue gunmen as part of a campaign to target dealers.
The bloodshed prompted an investigation by the ICC and a monthslong House of Representatives inquiry, as well as a separate Senate inquiry led by the cousin of the current president.
Duterte has repeatedly denied the extrajudicial killing of alleged drug suspects, although he also openly admitted to ordering police to shoot suspects who resist arrest.
'Day of justice'
Duterte's arrest and downfall stunned and drove families of the victims of his bloody crackdowns against illegal drugs to tears.
"This is a big, long-awaited day for justice," Randy delos Santos, the uncle of a teenager killed by police during an anti-drug operation in August 2017 in the Manila metropolis, told The AP.
"Now we feel that justice is rolling. We hope that top police officials and the hundreds of police officers who were involved in the illegal killings should also be placed in custody and punished," delos Santos said.
Three of the police officers who killed his nephew, Kian delos Santos, were convicted in 2018 for the high-profile murder, which prompted Duterte at the time to temporarily suspend his brutal anti-drugs crackdown.
The conviction was one of at least three, so far, against law enforcers involved in the anti-drugs campaign, reflecting the concerns of families of victims of suspected extrajudicial killings that they would not get justice in the Philippines, hence, their decision to seek the help of the ICC.
ICC's investigation
The ICC began investigating drug killings under Duterte from 1 November 2011, when he was still mayor of the southern city of Davao, to 16 March 2019, as possible crimes against humanity.
Duterte withdrew the Philippines in 2019 from the Rome Statute in a move human rights activists say was aimed at escaping accountability.
The Duterte administration moved to suspend the global court's investigation in late 2021 by arguing that Philippine authorities were already looking into the same allegations, arguing the ICC — a court of last resort — didn't have jurisdiction.
Appeals judges at the ICC ruled in 2023 the investigation could resume and rejected the Duterte administration's objections. Based in The Hague, the Netherlands, the ICC can step in when countries are unwilling or unable to prosecute suspects in the most heinous international crimes, including genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who succeeded Duterte in 2022 and became entangled in a bitter political dispute with the former president, has decided not to rejoin the global court.
But the Marcos administration has said it would cooperate if the ICC asks international police to take Duterte into custody through a so-called Red Notice, a request for law enforcement agencies worldwide to locate and temporarily arrest a crime suspect.
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