The Philippine government and police forces have utilized the country’s “war on drugs” as a pretext for committing widespread murders, according to a new FILE – Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte gestures during a Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-LakasBayan (PDP-LABAN) meeting in Manila, May 11, 2019. “This insatiable and vicious system rewards blind compliance and murder,” Amnesty International’s regional director for East and Southeast Asia, Nicholas Bequelin, said.In response to its findings, the rights group is calling for the U.N. to open an investigation into the killings.Iceland has submitted a draft resolution to the U.N. Human Rights Council, calling for a probe into the drug war.”President Duterte’s ‘war on drugs’ continues to be nothing but a large-scale murdering enterprise for which the poor continue to pay the highest price,” Bequelin said.Duterte’s government vows to defy any U.N. investigation. “They have no business interfering with us,” presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo said in comments published by The Washington Post. “They are insulting the intelligence of the Filipino people. At the same time, they are insulting our sovereignty,” he said.
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