Palace vows ‘fair, impartial’ probe into Bulacan drug deaths

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Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella. TOTO LOZANO/Presidential Photo

Malacañang on Thursday vowed to conduct a “fair and impartial” investigation into the killing of 32 drug suspects, whom police said resisted in the anti-drug operations in Bulacan.

The 32 drug suspects were killed in a span of 24 hours during the implementation of the “one-time, big-time” war on drugs raids.

Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella issued the statement a day after President Rodrigo Duterte described the drug killings as “good.”

READ: ‘That’s good,’ says Duterte on killing of 32 Bulacan druggies

“The ones who died in Bulacan, 32, in a massive raid, that is good. We could just kill another 32 everyday, then maybe we could reduce what ails this country,” Duterte said in mix Filipino and English.

But Abella assured the public of a thorough investigation on the killings in Bulacan in what police said was the highest death toll in a single day since the administration launched its brutal war on drugs in June 2016.

“There will be a fair and impartial investigation on the recent Bulacan raids,” he said.

Abella, however, did not mention if Malacañang would conduct its own investigation since the Philippine National Police (PNP) spokesperson, Sr. Supt. Dionardo Carlos, said that the PNP-Internal Affairs Office would conduct its probe as a standard operating procedure.

“The Bulacan raids, we have to underscore, are not the result of a single action, but a wide-ranging, simultaneous police operations against illegal drug offenders conducted in the whole province of Bulacan,” he said.

The spokesman reiterated that arresting officers were met with violent resistance as proven by the recovery of spent shells, firearms, grenades and several live ammunition in the crime scene.

The PNP has said that 32 people were killed while 107 drug suspects were arrested in the simultaneous “one-time, big-time” anti-drug operations by the Bulacan police on August 15. JPV

READ: Bulacan PNP war on drugs: 32 suspects killed in 24 hours