Duterte at The Hague
Picture: Rodrigo Duterte's Initial Appearance at The International Criminal Court, 14 March 2025 (Photo: ICC)
In an article by New Mandala, Patrick Peralta asserts that although the former president’s arrest marks a milestone for accountability and truth. But culpability for drug war abuses goes far beyond him, and the Philippine justice system remains ill-equipped to overcome the political forces that favor broad impunity.
Once deemed by most as politically invincible—and by others as “God’s anointed”— Rodrigo Duterte now finds himself imprisoned at The Hague, where he might spend his remaining years. Enforcing a warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC), Philippine police arrested the former president on 11 March at Manila’s main airport as he returned from Hong Kong.
The ICC charged Duterte with crimes against humanity committed during his presidency’s “war on drugs” and when he was mayor of Davao City. It was in these early years as mayor (1998–2008) when he formed and oversaw his motorcycle-riding “Davao Death Squad”, which summarily killed and disappeared over a thousand petty criminals, and which he scaled up nationally after his 2016 election. At the end of his presidency in 2022, the drug war had snuffed out more than 30,000 lives and destroyed alongside them many more livelihoods, most from Manila’s slums.
It is difficult to overstate the historic significance of the ICC’s capture of Duterte. He is the first Philippine leader to be arrested by an international tribunal, which even the dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. eluded. The arrest also comes at the heels of two other high-profile cases issued by the ICC on the same charges as Duterte: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Myanmar military junta head Min Aung Hlaing. Those orders, however, are unlikely to succeed, much like the ICC’s 2022 warrant for the arrest of Russia’s Vladimir Putin. As the Court’s most recent custody since 2021, the Philippine leader’s case would thereby test the power of international law.
