‘No cop would’ve died if I ordered killings’

President Duterte said on Wednesday the police would not have sustained casualties if he had ordered targeted executions in his war against drugs, and branded human rights groups “stupid” for threatening to haul him before the International Court of Justice.

Mr. Duterte, who has invited United Nations experts to come to the country and investigate the killings, again lashed out at groups accusing him of having a hand in the killings and advised them instead to study criminal law before threatening to sue him.

“The  reason I invited them is they should look into records of how many soldiers and policemen were killed. If  it’s just a matter of EJKs, I wouldn’t have lost a single one,” the President said, referring to extrajudicial killings. “All you have to do is ask them to kneel down and shoot (them) in the head.”

He said an average of two policemen die each day in the government’s anti-drugs and crime war. In all, nearly 4,000 suspects have died in the crackdown,  about half of them considered “deaths under investigation,” a euphemism for deaths attributed to vigilantes.

Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella said the Palace was still awaiting the response of UN Special Rapporteur Agnes Callamard to Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea’s Sept. 26 letter inviting her to investigate the extrajudicial killings.

Probe killing of cops, too

“In its invitation, the Palace urged—and I think this is notable—the UN rapporteur to include in her investigation the killings of law enforcers by drug suspects so that she could obtain an accurate perspective of the drug problem in the country,” Abella said.

Since August, Callamard has been making a strong stand against the wave of killings as she stressed that the drug suspects should  be “judged in a court of law, not by gunmen on the streets.”

“Claims to fight the 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,” said Callamard.

The invitation was meant for Callamard to decide whether the allegations were “legally and factually sound.” But the foreign department earlier said that for safety reasons she would be restricted from slum areas where most of the killings took place.

Death of innocents

Medialdea echoed Mr.  Duterte’s previous demands that he be allowed to question Callamard’s motives for the investigation and why his administration has been singled out “when there are other nations responsible for the death of innocent and defenseless individuals elsewhere in the world.”

Abella however could not say if Mr. Duterte would push through with his previous declaration challenging US President Barack Obama and the European Union to conduct their own probe’s subject to the same conditions imposed on Callamard.

Stupid

On Wednesday, Mr. Duterte called out rights groups accusing him of encouraging extrajudicial killings for “acting too stupid” and threatening to take him to court.

“The human rights threatening me with an international court of justice case is stupid,” he said. “You know, the crime you’re accusing me of must be a crime in my own country. There is no crime at all in the law books… which states that the President cannot threaten criminals to leave the city or I will kill you.”