CHR backs House probe on Duterte-era drug war deaths

The Commission on Human Rights (CHR) has expressed support for the ongoing House investigations on the drug war deaths in police operations during the administration of former President Rodrigo Duterte.

“The Commission supports the investigation by the Quad Com (quadruple House Committees), your honor. In fact, we are being invited as one of the resource persons,” CHR chairperson and lawyer Richard Palpal-latoc told the House appropriations committee during the deliberations on CHR’s proposed P1 billion budget for 2025.

“We were supposed to attend the hearing in [Bacolor] Pampanga, but we were informed that our attendance is not required yet, so we did not attend that [day],” Palpal-latoc added.

Muntinlupa representative Jaime Fresenedi also asked the CHR chairperson if the CHR takes offense in the Quad Com probe on drug war deaths.

Palpal-latoc replied that the Congress’ probe does not affect CHR’s work because Congress and CHR have different mandates that complement each other.

“We have different mandates, Your Honor. The Commission investigates human rights violations. On the other hand, the Congress, the House of Representatives, investigates the matter in aid of legislation. There is no conflict in that,” the CHR chairperson said.

“We have no negative or whatever reactions to the hearings conducted. And I would [also] like to mention the Commission is conducting its own independent investigation in the extrajudicial killings and in fact, we recently reconstituted our EJK (extrajudicial killings) task force to complete the investigation of the CHR on the cases of killings in relation to the drug war,” he added.

Compensation

During the same budget deliberations, Fresnedi and Kabataan party-list lawmaker Raoul Manuel also asked Palpal-latoc if the CHR would support moves to compensate victims of the drug war deaths during the Duterte administration.

Palpal-latoc said that the CHR does not have a position yet on compensating the victims of drug war deaths, but that the CHR is for any measure that would compensate anybody who has been a victim of human rights violations.

“Isa po sa mga mahalagang tignan po sana ay hindi lamang po extrajudicial killings. Dapat po lahat ng grave human rights violation should be compensated,” he said.

(It is important to note that human rights violations do not only include extrajudicial killings. All victims of grave human rights violations should be compensated.)

“Victims of grave human rights violations, especially grave violations, should be compensated by the state, and we will provide recommendations,” he added.

Former President Duterte and other top officials of the Duterte administration are already being investigated by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in connection with the alleged commission of crimes against humanity for systematic drug war deaths in police operations during his tenure. 

These deaths reached around 6,000 based on police records, but human rights groups contend that the deaths reached as much as 30,000, including vigilante killings, due to Duterte's policy.

The former Chief Executive, however, has insisted that the Philippines is not under ICC jurisdiction due to Manila's unilateral withdrawal from the Rome Statute in March 2019. —VAL, GMA Integrated News