A wave of online falsehoods from supporters of former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte has emerged following his arrest by the International Criminal Court (ICC), with analysts arguing the misinformation campaign could not only fail to help his case but also backfire by affecting judicial decisions on his interim release.
Duterte was arrested at the Manila airport on March 11 as he returned from Hong Kong and was then placed on a government-paid private flight to The Hague, where he faces charges of crimes against humanity for the thousands of extrajudicial killings that occurred during his administration’s violent war on drugs.