Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra on Tuesday said the Philippines cannot stop the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor from interviewing persons of interest in its investigation on the Duterte administration’s war on drugs.
“[T]he Philippine government cannot stop him from proceeding in any way he wants,” Guevarra said in a message to reporters.
“He can directly interview persons of interest online, through the phone, by email, or face to face, subject to the consent of these persons,” he added.
Guevarra did not name names, but former senator Antonio Trillanes IV earlier said that Senator Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa and four other former ranking police officials have been tagged as suspects.
Trillanes posted a supposed redacted copy of an order by the ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) on X (formerly Twitter).
Others supposedly named in the document were former PNP chief Oscar Albayalde, former Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) chief Romeo Caramat Jr., former National Police Commission commissioner Edilberto Leonardo, and former PNP Intelligence Officer Eleazar Mata.
Guevarra, meanwhile, maintained that the Philippines has disengaged from the ICC and has no legal duty to lend the body any assistance.
The Philippines, under then President Rodrigo Duterte, withdrew from the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC, in 2019 after the tribunal began a probe into his drug war.
“The ICC prosecutor cannot expect that the Philippine government will facilitate for him,” Guevarra said.
When sought for comment on the supposed tagging, Dela Rosa only dismissed Trillanes’ post, saying there is nothing new to it.
“My name [has] always [been] mentioned since 2016. Seems like a broken record that keeps on repeating the same lines,” he said.
Meanwhile, Albayalde said he is ready to face the ICC.
Based on government records, around 6,200 drug suspects were killed during the Duterte administration’s anti-drug operations. Human rights organizations, however, say that the number may reach 30,000 due to the unreported related slays.
In January 2023, the ICC authorized the reopening of the inquiry after it was suspended in November 2021.
The ICC Appeals Chamber in July 2023 also denied the government’s plea against the resumption of the inquiry, prompting numerous government officials to speak against continued engagement with the ICC.
For his part, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. earlier said that the government would not serve any arrest warrant from the ICC against Duterte. He has said that he does not recognize the jurisdiction of ICC in the Philippines and considers the tribunal as a threat to the country’s sovereignty.—AOL, GMA Integrated News
