The Philippine government said on Friday (Jan 27) it intended to appeal an International Criminal Court decision to reopen an inquiry into Manila’s brutal anti-drug campaign, which left thousands dead.
Former president Rodrigo Duterte, who initiated the drug war, pulled the Philippines out of the ICC in 2019, a year after the Hague-based tribunal began a preliminary probe into the crackdown
The ICC launched a formal inquiry in September 2021, only to suspend it two months later after Manila said it was re-examining several hundred cases of drug operations that led to deaths at the hands of police, hitmen and vigilantes. The ICC prosecutor later asked to reopen the inquiry in June 2022.
Announcing the probe’s resumption on Thursday, the ICC said its pre-trial chamber was “not satisfied that the Philippines is undertaking relevant investigations that would warrant a deferral of the court’s investigations”.
Menardo Guevarra, the chief lawyer of President Ferdinand Marcos’ government, told AFP: “It is our intention to exhaust our legal remedies, more particularly elevating the matter to the ICC appeals chamber.”