‘Government taking right path on return to ICC’

MANILA, Philippines — The government is headed in the right direction with its reassessment of possibly returning to the International Criminal Court (ICC), former senator Leila de Lima said yesterday.

“The direction that the current government is pursuing is the right path. It is correct. It has my support. I’m talking about the reassessment of their position in regard to ICC,” De Lima said in an interview with Mel Sta. Maria.

This response came after President Marcos announced last month that proposals for the country’s return to the ICC are “under study.”

De Lima expressed her support for the possible return to the Rome Statute, emphasizing that the withdrawal from it was “wrong in the first place.”

“The withdrawal in itself is wholly inconsistent. The motive behind withdrawing, unilaterally at that, is already a mistake,” De Lima said.

“It’s so that he (former president Rodrigo Duterte) can avoid accountability because he knows ICC probers were going to look into the drug war killings,” she added.

In March 2018, Duterte ordered the country’s withdrawal from the Rome Statute following the preliminary investigation launched by the ICC chief prosecutor against the alleged crimes committed during the war on drugs.

De Lima hoped that the results of the government’s reassessment would be positive, claiming that return to the ICC would help the country fight crimes against human rights.

“Let’s rejoin the ICC because it’s the right thing to do. And we should cooperate to give justice to the thousands of victims of extrajudicial killing during the drug war,” she added.