Duterte gov’t not cowed by UNCHR “maliciously partisan” resolution – Palace

July 12, 2019

Malacanang said on Friday that the Duterte administration would not be cowed or weakened by the United Nations Human Rights Council "maliciously partisan" resolution against the increasing killings in the Philippines.

In a statement, Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said the Palace objects and condemns the Iceland-backed resolution, which 17 other countries favored during the 41st session of the UNCHR in Geneva on Thursday.

Saying that the resolution was based on "false information" and "unverified facts and figures," Panelo, also chief presidential legal counsel, questioned the propriety of the resolution as well as its validity.

"The Duterte  presidency is not cowed or weakened by such resolution," he said.

Eighteen of the 47-member UNCHR voted for the Iceland-led resolution. On the other hand, 14 member states voted against the resolution while 15 abstained.

"The voting is not decisive in its favor," Panelo said, noting a simple majority would have been 24.

"This means that majority of the members are not really convinced of the resolution calling for the investigation of the so-called extra-judicial killings in our country," he said.

"The resolution is grotesquely one-sided, outrageously narrow, and maliciously partisan. It reeks of nauseating politics completely devoid of respect for the sovereignty of our country,  even as it is bereft of the gruesome realities of the drug menace in the country," Panelo added.

He also said the resolution was offensive and insulting to the sensibilities of the 80 percent Filipinos who expressed satisfaction to the performance of President Rodrigo Duterte based on the latest survey.

"The resolution demonstrates how the Western powers are scornful of our sovereign exercise of protecting our people from the scourge of prohibited drugs that threaten to destroy the fabric of our society. Their intrusive abuse is patent and condemnable," he said.              

"It smacks of politicization designed to force our free state to be subservient to their imagined superiority," Panelo stressed.

It is evident that the resolution was designed to embarrass the Philippines before the international community and the global audience, he added.

"Any attempt to undermine our sovereignty will receive an uproarious rejection from our countrymen, it being a naked affront to their authority to run their domestic affairs they deem fit under the prevailing circumstances," he said.

UNCHR adopted the resolution as the number of killings of drug suspects in the country continues to rise.

Government records showed over 6,000 individuals have already been killed in the anti-drug operations by authorities since the war on drugs was launched by the administration in June 2016.

Human rights groups and other critics have claimed the killings have reached 27,000. Celerina Monte/DMS