Philippine president threatens to quit UN

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MANILA, Aug 21, (Agencies): Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte railed against the United Nations on Sunday after it called for an end to the wave of killings unleashed by his war on drugs, saying he might leave the organisation and invite China and others to form a new one. Two UN human rights experts last week urged Manila to stop the extrajudicial executions and killings that have escalated since Duterte won the presidency on a promise to wipe out drugs. About 900 suspected drug traffickers have been killed since he came to power after winning the election on May 9.

Duterte on Friday denied that the government was responsible and in a middle-of-the-night news conference in his home town, Davao, said the deaths were not the work of the police and invited UN experts to investigate themselves.

The news conference was broadcast by local media and the full version was posted on Facebook by GMA news. “I will prove to the world that you are a very stupid expert,” he said, urging them to count not just the number of drug-related deaths but also the innocent lives lost to drugs. He then launched an attack on the United Nations and its members — including by inference Manila’s traditionally close ally, Washington – saying, it could not fulfil its own mandate but was “worrying about the bones of criminals piling up”.

Separate
“I do not want to insult you. But maybe we’ll just have to decide to separate from the United Nations,” he said. Criticising the UN for not doing enough to address hunger and terrorism and for not being able to do anything about Syria and Iraq and allowing big powers to bomb villages and kill innocent civilians, he said he would invite China and African nations to form another global organisation.

“You now, United Nations, if you can say one bad thing about me, I can give you 10 (about you). I tell you, you are an inutile. Because if you are really true to your mandate, you could have stopped all these wars and killing.” Asked about the possible consequences of his comments, he said: “What is … repercussions? I don’t give a … to them.” He said the United Nations should have acted according to protocol by sending someone such as a rapporteur to talk to him. “You do not just go out and give a statement against a country,” he said.

Duterte pointed to the haunting image of a bloodied child being pulled from the rubble of a missile-struck building in the Syrian city of Aleppo to note the inability of the US and the UN to stop such deadly confl icts, complaining that he comes under fi re for the killings of criminals. Agnes Callamard, the new UN Special Rapporteur on summary executions, suggested that Philippine offi – cials could be held liable, saying in a recent statement that “claims to fi ght illicit drug trade do not absolve the government from its international legal obligations and do not shield state actors or others from responsibility for illegal killings.”

Problem
Criticisms against Duterte’s crusade against a problem that he says has become a pandemic provoked an angry outburst from Duterte, who held a news conference after midnight Saturday that dragged on for more than two hours. “Look at the iconic boy that was taken out from the rubble and he was made to sit in the ambulance and we saw it,” Duterte said, referring to the photo of a 5-year-old Syrian boy, Omran Daqneesh, that has gone viral online. “Why is it that United States is not doing anything? I do not read you,” Duterte said. “Anybody in that stupid body complaining about the stench there of death?”

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