ICC Charges Ex-Philippines President and Trump Darling Duterte With Drug War Murders

The International Criminal Court on Monday charged former Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte with the crime against humanity of murder for having presided over the extrajudicial execution of drug dealers—killings that drew praise from US President Donald Trump.

In a 15-page charge sheet, ICC prosecutors accused Duterte of "indirect co-perpetration" of murder both during his 2016-22 presidency and previous tenure as mayor of Davao.

ICC prosecutors said that "Duterte and his co-perpetrators shared a common plan or agreement to ‘neutralize’ alleged criminals in the Philippines"—including drug producers, sellers, and users—"thrdough violent crimes including murder," often committed by death squads.

Deputy ICC Prosecutor Mame Mandiaye Niang charged Duterte with three counts:

• Murder as a crime against humanity for the killing of 19 victims in 2013-16 when he was mayor of Davao;
• Murder as a crime against humanity for the killing of 14 so-called "high-value targets" in 2016-17 when he was president; and
• Murder and attempted murder as crimes against humanity, involving 45 victims—43 of them murdered—during so-called "clearance" operations in 2016-18.

Filipino government data indicate that at least 6,252 people were killed during police operations between July 1, 2016, and May 31, 2022. However, human rights groups estimate that as many as 30,000 people were extrajudicially murdered during that period.

Advocates sought more charges against Duterte, with victim's attorney Kristina Conti lamenting that the prosecution's narrower scope "does not show the full extent" of the ex-president's crimes.

"This is an obvious shortcoming of the legal process that is dispiriting for the thousands of victims of killings, illegal arrests and detentions, trumped-up charges, unlawful house raids, and other rights violations and abuses," the National Union of People's Lawyers and Rise Up for Life and for Rights said in a joint statement Tuesday.

"Proceeding with a smaller section of crimes against Duterte may be a strategy for the prosecution, but it is a disservice to the victims of the mass murders, and his other crimes as well," the groups added.

The ICC must now decide whether Duterte is fit to stand trial. His lawyers argue that the 80-year-old suffers “cognitive impairment in multiple domains" and that his health is "progressively deteriorating."

Conti told Rappler—which was targeted for closure amid its critical coverage of Duterte—that the defendant's claims are “a desperate, time-worn, and calculated ploy to paint himself aggrieved.”

While Duterte remains popular among right-wing Filipinos, opposition lawmakers welcomed the former president's prosecution.

Federal lawmaker Leila de Lima—a vocal Duterte critic who spent 2,454 days behind bars following a 2017 arrest on bogus drug-related charges that were subsequently dismissed—welcomed the ICC charges in a Monday post on the social media site X.

"We already warned Duterte to stop the killings or he will inevitably face justice before the ICC, no matter how far off in the future," de Lima wrote. "That future we warned him about is now the present we are witnessing."

"Duterte did not lack warnings and advice from the Philippine human rights community about his future accountability," she continued. "He ignored all these warnings at his own peril. His detention and indictment for the drug war killings are the direct consequence of his own actions."

"As we have said again and again, he has no one to blame but himself," de Lima added. "His co-conspirators will follow him to the Hague soon enough."

In 2017, Trump said that Duterte was doing an "unbelievable job on the drug problem." Trump would later propose executing drug dealers in the United States.

In recent weeks, in likely violation of both US and international law, Trump has ordered deadly attacks on boats his administration claimed were transporting cocaine from Venezuela to the US.