The International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (ICHRP) calls on foreign governments to impose Magnitsky sanctions on Philippine officials. Such sanctions allow states to punish individuals who share responsibility for human rights abuses in the Philippines. The sanctions can include entry bans and financial measures.
The ICHRP justifies the campaign with ‘the absence so far of genuine accountability for these crimes through international mechanisms, such as the International Criminal Court and the UN Human Rights Council’. They call for sanctions for both the “architects” of the so-called war on drugs and for those who maintain its infrastructure – for example, acting President Rodrigo Duterte, executives of the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), judges and public officials. Presidential spokesperson Martin Andanar calls the campaign a move to ‘name and shame the Philippines before the international community’.
Other human rights organizations also denounce the lack of action of the international community. At the 49th session of the UN Human Rights Council, Ahmed Adam from the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development underlined that the objective of the UN Joint Programme (UNJP) is insufficient: ‘Without genuine accountability, the joint program will serve only as a means for the [Philippine] government to evade justice under the cover of cooperation’.