Human Rights Watch has denounced a call by Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte for police to shoot rights activists who get in the way of his bloody drug war. Duterte should immediately withdraw his statement or be investigated for possibly instigating or inciting violence against Philippine rights advocates, the New York-based advocacy group said.
Speaking following the bloodiest night of his one-year tenure in high office, Duterte said he would investigate human rights defenders criticising him, or order officers to kill them.
Maybe we can reduce what ails this country. His call on Wednesday for police to consider human rights advocates legitimate drug war targets is a sinister escalation in his rhetoric, Human Rights Watch said.
President urges officers to kill dozens of drug suspects every day after series of 67 operations in province north of Manila. Duterte praised the operation in Bulacan, which took place from Monday night until Tuesday afternoon, and urged police to kill dozens of drug suspects every day. Bulacan has been a major target in the drugs war, with people killed and 4, offenders arrested, according to Caramat, making it the second-biggest hotspot in the crackdown outside the Manila area.
More than 2, other people have been killed in drug-related crimes and thousands more murdered in unexplained circumstances, according to police data. At the press conference, Caramat defended the police action, saying the deaths occurred during shootouts, and were not executions as activists have often alleged. Political opponents of Duterte have filed a complaint with the international criminal court ICC , accusing the president and top aides of crimes against humanity, arguing they failed to address allegations of widespread police abuses that have been brought to their attention.
