{"id":10643,"date":"2025-01-27T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-27T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/?p=10643"},"modified":"2025-01-24T13:43:45","modified_gmt":"2025-01-24T12:43:45","slug":"quad-committee-recommends-charges-against-rodrigo-duterte","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/quad-committee-recommends-charges-against-rodrigo-duterte\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cQuad Committee\u201d recommends charges against Rodrigo Duterte"},"content":{"rendered":"

On December 18, 2024, the so-called quad committee of the Philippine House of Representatives presented<\/a> its first progress report on a joint investigation over the past months into the links between illegal drug trade, Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs) as well as extrajudicial killings (EJK) and human rights violations in the context of former President Rodrigo Duterte’s anti-drug campaign. According to the report, after more than 13 hearings and numerous witness testimonies, the investigation uncovered<\/a> a \u201charrowing<\/a> narrative of abuse of power and institutional impunity during the Duterte administration.\u201d The committee also concluded<\/a> that a system existed that incentivized the killing of drug-related suspects.<\/p>\n

The key recommendation of the quad committee was<\/a> to file charges against former President Rodrigo Duterte and the Senators Ronald Dela Rosa and Christopher Go for alleged crimes against humanity. Charges are<\/a> also to be filed against former police chiefs Oscar Albayalde and Debold Sinas as well as police colonels Royina Garma, Edilberto Leonardo, and Hermina Espino, who implemented Duterte’s anti-drug campaign. The recommended charges relate<\/a> to alleged violations of the Act on Crimes against International Humanitarian Law, Genocide, and other Crimes Against Humanity. (Sec. 6 of Republic Act No. 9851).<\/p>\n

In its report, the committee also recommended<\/a> the creation of a so-called \u201canti-EJK bill\u201d (House Bill No. 10986) in order to legally establish a definition of EJK and enable<\/a> criminal prosecution of EJKs. Currently, there is<\/a> only a political and no criminal definition of EJK (Republic Act No. 11188 on the Protection of Children in Armed Conflicts). EJKs are<\/a> therefore unpunished killings because the state actors, as suspects, cannot effectively hold themselves accountable. The Anti-EJK Act would define<\/a> EJK as a killing \u201ccommitted by a public officer, person in authority, agent of a person in authority, agent of a person in authority, or any person who is acting under the actual or apparent authority of the State.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another recommendation of the committee concerned<\/a> the reintroduction of the death penalty for particularly heinous crimes, which would, however, meet with widespread criticism and resistance. The report also recommended<\/a> the freezing of the assets of Harry Roque, former spokesman of ex-President Duterte, who is suspected of having massively enriched himself through his links to illegal activities from a scam hub (POGO) in Porac. Roques fled<\/a> abroad despite congressional warrants.<\/p>\n

According to a statement<\/a> by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on January 3, 2025, the Department of Justice will review the report of the quad committee in order to decide on possible legal action. At the same time, Marcos Jr. announced<\/a> a realignment of the security strategy, which means the dismissal of Vice President Sara Duterte from the National Security Council. Observers suspect<\/a> that this decision is linked to Duterte’s death threats against Marcos Jr. last November 2024.<\/p>\n

According to a survey conducted<\/a> in January 2025, 61% of the Philippine population support the investigation by the quad committee. Despite the comprehensive investigation, it remains<\/a> unclear whether the investigation will continue after the upcoming congressional elections in May 2025. In addition, the House of Representatives faces<\/a> the challenge of including the EJKs and other human rights violations under the Marcos Jr. government in its investigation. According to the documentation of Dahas, a project of the University of the Philippines, 883 drug-related killings occurred<\/a> under Marcos Jr. until January 15, 2025.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Photo \u00a9 AMP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On December 18, 2024, the so-called quad committee of the Philippine House of Representatives presented its first progress report on a joint investigation over the past months into the links between illegal drug trade, Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs) as well as extrajudicial killings (EJK) and human rights violations in the context of former President […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":9509,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[64,73,58,59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-war-on-drugs-en","category-aktuelles-en","category-human-rights-news","category-internal-affairs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10643"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10690,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10643\/revisions\/10690"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}