PBBM thumbs down PH return to ICC

PRESIDENT Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr., has thumbed down the possibility of the Philippines rejoining the International Criminal Court (ICC) after the country’s withdrawal became effective in 2019.

In a talk to the media last August 1, 2022, PBBM said the decision not to rejoin the ICC was arrived at after his meeting a week before with some members of his Cabinet, namely: At the meeting last week were Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra, Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile, Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, Executive Secretary Vic Rodriguez, and former Palace spokesman Harry Roque.

The Chief Executive called the meeting after ICC prosecutor Karim Khan, from Great Britain, last June 24, 2022, announced he had asked the ICC pre-trial chamber for permission to continue with the investigation of the alleged ‘bloody’ war on drugs launched by the Duterte administration, anchored mainly on ‘evidence’ and news reports gathered by American-paid local media organizations like the online news outfit, ‘Rappler’ and front organizations of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), which all claimed, wrongly, that the campaign resulted to between 27,000 to 30,000 deaths.

The official figure, according to relevant government data, is 6,252 drug suspects, from 2016 to May 2022, a figure cited by Remulla to the media.

The sole purpose of the ICC probe is to embarrass the country and undermine our sovereignty by hauling President Duterte in a foreign court and jailing him in a foreign land, along with other Philippine officials such as his first police director general, Ronald ‘Bato’ dela Rosa, who is now a Philippine senator.

“What we discussed during the meeting is what the ICC is saying that they will proceed with an investigation.

The sole purpose of the ICC probe is to embarrass the country and undermine our sovereignty by hauling President Duterte in a foreign court and jailing him in a foreign land, along with other Philippine officials such as his first police director general, Ronald ‘Bato’ dela Rosa, who is now a Philippine senator.

“But what we are saying is it is already being investigated here. The investigation is ongoing, so why would there be a need for it?” PBBM explained.

Marcos was referring to the principle of “complementarity” whereby the ICC agrees not to investigate any country or its leaders for war crimes or crimes against humanity in case an investigation is already ongoing in the accused country and in cases where the country’s judicial system is clearly functioning.

Referring to this, Remulla last August 4, 20202, said, “It’s not perfect but it’s functioning, we are not a banana republic, so why are we, why should they want to go to the country?”

It was the ICC’s ignoring of the principle of complementarity that prompted President Duterte to order, on March 14, 2018, the country’s withdrawal to the ICC, with the process being completed a year later, on March 17, 2019. The Philippines acceded to the ICC in November 2011, under the Noynoy Aquino presidency.

Showing clear bias against Pres. Duterte and the Philippines, the ICC continues to insists it has the ‘jurisdiction’ to still investigate, covering the period when the country was still a member or from June 2016 until March 2019.

However, such intransigence was not evidence against powerful countries like the United States, Russia and China, among others. Both the US and China did not ratify the ‘Rome Statute of 1998’ that formally created the ICC. Russia, on the other hand, withdraw its membership effective on November 30, 2016.

The US, for its part, under President Donald Trump, has even sanctioned ICC prosecutors and threatened to arrest them should they enter the United States to investigate the US war crimes in Afghanistan.

In rejecting the ICC’s intrusion on America’s conduct in Afghanistan, Trump’s Attorney General, William Barr, also noted: “The US government has reason to doubt the honesty of the ICC. The Department of Justice has received substantial credible information that raises serious concerns about a long history of financial corruption and malfeasance at the highest levels of the office of the prosecutor.”

As expected, PBBM’s decision only disappointed CPP front organizations and its political ally, the Liberal Party (LP), now headed by Sen. Riza Hontiveros.