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  • The Implications of The Issues in President Duterte's 2017 SONA To The International Community

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    Gail Cariño
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    President Duterte's 2017 State of the Nation Address highlighted his administration's war on drugs and request to reinstate the death penalty. However, these policies have implications for the Philippines' international obligations and relations. The war on drugs has been criticized by international organizations for human rights violations and extrajudicial killings. Meanwhile, reinstating the death penalty would violate treaties that the Philippines has ratified banning capital punishment. While the government argues these are domestic issues, many agreements and principles of international law require respecting human rights.

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    President Duterte's 2017 State of the Nation Address highlighted his administration's war on drugs and request to reinstate the death penalty. However, these policies have implications for the Philippines' international obligations and relations. The war on drugs has been criticized by international organizations for human rights violations and extrajudicial killings. Meanwhile, reinstating the death penalty would violate treaties that the Philippines has ratified banning capital punishment. While the government argues these are domestic issues, many agreements and principles of international law require respecting human rights.

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    25 views4 pages

    The Implications of The Issues in President Duterte's 2017 SONA To The International Community

    Uploaded by

    Gail Cariño
    President Duterte's 2017 State of the Nation Address highlighted his administration's war on drugs and request to reinstate the death penalty. However, these policies have implications for the Philippines' international obligations and relations. The war on drugs has been criticized by international organizations for human rights violations and extrajudicial killings. Meanwhile, reinstating the death penalty would violate treaties that the Philippines has ratified banning capital punishment. While the government argues these are domestic issues, many agreements and principles of international law require respecting human rights.

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    of 4

    Marianne Gail Z.

    Cariño
    AB Political Science IV-A
    The Implications of the Issues in President Duterte’s 2017 SONA to the

    International Community

    The much anticipated 2nd State of the Nation Address by the Philippine’s

    president took place on July 24, 2017 in front of lawmakers and guests in the

    Batasang Pambansa Complex. With too much going on and after all the

    controversies that has gone by in his administration, one must wonder what

    President Rodrigo Roa Duterte has to say for his 2nd SONA. In this article

    however, we will be giving emphasis on the issues that has implications to the

    international community. These issues include the administration’s “War on

    Drugs” and the reimposition of death penalty. President Duterte is famous for

    being foul-mouthed to almost everyone against him on these different issues and

    people that he’s against including international personalities and he did not let

    this event pass.

    President Duterte had highlighted his administration’s war on drugs that

    has been his goal from the very beginning of his term. He stated in his SONA

    that “the fight will not stop until those who deal in it understand that they have to

    cease, they have to stop because the alternatives are either jail or hell.” Before

    he was elected president of the Philippines, his promise was to eradicate the

    country’s illegal drug problem in a span of 3-6 months but until now, the problem

    doesn’t seem to lessen at all. Since then, he has been criticized and questioned

    by different sectors including the international community after many deaths has

    been reported that is related to this bloody war. In this war, the president has

    urged people to be vigilant and kill drug users, giving them a “license to kill”. It

    has then raised a series of questions regarding human rights violations and due

    process of law. This war has been condemned by many, however, the

    government dismissed this by saying that these groups are intervening with the

    country’s domestic jurisdiction. Nevertheless, the Philippines cannot just ignore

    what these organizations has to say regarding treaties or conventions violated


    Marianne Gail Z. Cariño
    AB Political Science IV-A
    because "Pacta sunt servanda” ('agreements must be kept') is the most

    fundamental principle of international law and it would be very undermining if the

    country starts to take a different approach to treaties it have signed. The

    Philippines cannot just choose what it wants to comply with, without losing the

    moral authority to ask other countries to oblige to other treaties.

    One of which this war has not respected through its human rights

    violations is the very Charter of United Nations which is stated under Article 55. It

    says that it should promote “universal respect for, and observance of, human

    rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex,

    language, or religion.” The relationship between human rights treaties and

    international drug conventions is an essential issue that still needs special

    attention from international bodies as both human right treaties and drug

    conventions are under the same United Nations “umbrella”; however, they have

    been treated by international drug control bodies in separate ways, as if they had

    diverse sources.1 The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) also

    said that such an endorsement of extrajudicial killing in the campaign against

    illegal drugs of the government was illegal and a breach of fundamental rights

    and freedoms. Yury Fedotov, the UNODC executive director, said that the

    increasing number of extrajudicial killings in the country contravened international

    drug control conventions and did not serve the cause of justice.2

    Different international organizations have likewise reacted to the country’s

    War on Drugs. According to a United Nations-affiliated group which is the

    International Narcotics Control Board, the extrajudicial action that is taken to

    control and exterminate the drug problems of the country is against international

    drug conventions. Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International has

    both stated that the president and other senior government officials that are

    1 Labate, B.C.; Cavnar, C. 2014. Prohibition, Religious Freedom, and Human Rights: Regulating
    Traditional Drug Use
    2 http://www.philstar.com/news-feature/2017/03/03/1677617/what-some-international-groups-say-

    about-philippine-war-drugs
    Marianne Gail Z. Cariño
    AB Political Science IV-A
    involved in these human rights violations could be charged with crimes against

    humanity for actions and words that incited the commission of murder and other

    acts of violence against drug suspects and criminals. The police are likewise

    liable of many of the deaths according to HRW.

    So even though President Duterte has said that it is within the domestic

    jusrisdiction of the Philippines, the International Criminal Court (ICC) (to which

    the Philippines is a party) stated that the extrajudicial killings occurring in the

    country may fall under the jurisdiction of the ICC, if it can determine the killings

    are being carried out in accordance with a policy established by the State. The

    Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the ICCPR are also conventions to which the

    Philippines are part of and both protect the interests of civilians, prevent

    mistreatment of suspects taken into custody, and require fair and impartial trials

    for any person accused of a crime.

    In connection with President Duterte’s War on Drugs which involves

    human rights violations is the reimposition of death penalty. It also has been one

    of his promises when he was campaigning for presidency and in his 2nd SONA,

    he asked the Congress to act on all pending legislations concerning the

    reimposition of death penalty on heinous crimes, giving emphasis on the

    trafficking of illegal drugs. He said that "in the Philippines, it's really an eye for an

    eye, a tooth for a tooth". With this, the UN immediately reacted and warned the

    Philippines that it will break international law. It has appealed to uphold the

    international human rights obligations of the Philippines against the death

    penalty. The UN explained that the Philippines, in 2007, ratified the Second

    Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

    (ICCPR), which aims to abolish the death penalty. According to UN High

    Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, "International law does

    not permit a State that has ratified or acceded to the Second Optional Protocol to
    Marianne Gail Z. Cariño
    AB Political Science IV-A
    denounce it or withdraw from it.”3 This ICCPR however, upon further research,

    does not directly prohibit death penalty instead, it regulates a number of

    limitations on it. Under Article 6, death penalty must be limited to only the most

    serious crimes and cannot be imposed if (a) a fair trial has not been granted; (b)

    other ICCPR rights have been violated; (c) the crime was not punishable by the

    death penalty at the time it was committed; (d) the offender is not entitled to seek

    pardon or a lesser sentence; (e) the offender is under the age of 18; and (f) the

    offender is pregnant. I see the first limitation as the loophole in reimposing the

    death penalty since President Duterte doesn’t seem hard on the due process of

    law when it comes to drug-related cases. In addition to that, drug-related cases

    would not meet the category under “most serious crimes.”

    When Duterte first took office as the President of the Philippines, he

    vowed that the Philippines "will honor treaties and international obligations" that it

    has entered into. Bottom-line is, even if he did not vow to do that in the first

    place, we should still respect the agreements that we have entered into so that

    other states won’t slowly lose their respect to the Philippines.

    I believe that these two key issues that I chose to discuss are morally

    unjustifiable. Even when the government finds a way to justify these legally, I

    firmly believe that it is counterproductive and won’t be effective in the long run. It

    has been evident in countries imposing opposite kind of sanctions. We can

    observe that in countries where they treat their criminals as patients, the cells in

    their jails are almost empty because of the low number of criminality but in

    countries who treats criminals as animals, the criminality rate is growing larger

    and larger. What we need to learn and instill in the generations to come is

    discipline compassion because our problems all boils down to our very self. If

    discipline and empathy for others is realized, the international community would

    be a better place.

    3 http://www.rappler.com/nation/155014-un-death-penalty-philippines-violate-international-law

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