Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, May 17) — Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa should urgently be held responsible for enforcing the bloody war on drugs, an international human rights group said, as the country’s former top cop is poised to win a Senate seat.
“Now that Dela Rosa is a policymaker, there is renewed urgency in bringing all those responsible for ‘drug war’ crimes to justice,” Carlos Conde of the Human Rights Watch’s Asia division said in a statement Thursday.
Dela Rosa is so far at fifth place in partial and official tally in the Senate race.
Conde said Dela Rosa, along with other officials involved in the anti-drug campaign, “shouldn’t receive a get-out-of-jail-free card,” a term in a game board, despite their victories in the May 13 midterm elections.
Dela Rosa was chief of the Philippine National Police when President Rodrigo Duterte launched the drug war in 2016. Under his watch, Duterte suspended the flagship anti-drug campaign “Oplan Tokhang” amid alleged police abuses, and tasked the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency to take the lead role in the fight against drugs.
Government data show over 5,000 suspects have been killed in anti-drug operations. Critics say the President’s public pronouncements have resulted in thousands more extrajudicial killings, a claim Malacañang has repeatedly denied.
“Dela Rosa presided over a Philippine National Police that routinely shot and killed drug suspects, claiming without proof they resisted arrest,” Conde said. He stressed, however, that investigations made by the HRW and other human rights groups show that the police planted weapons and drugs to justify the killings.
The International Criminal Court is looking into the killings to the dismay of Duterte, who even threatened to have its prosecutor arrested if she sets foot in the country. He also withdrew the Philippines from the Rome Statute, the treaty that formed the ICC, and stressed he will never submit to a probe.
