London-based Amnesty International urged the United Nations Human Rights Council to approve a resolution calling for an investigation into the Philippines, where there was a “perilous normalization” of illegal executions and police abuses. In three-quarters of incidents, those killed were on “watch lists” of people in communities with suspected use or involvement in drugs, Amnesty found. It said the other incidents pointed broadly to previous patterns of executions, but it could not obtain sufficient evidence and information to be certain. The police narrative that undercover officers posing as drug buyers had killed only in self defense “doesn’t meet the feeblest standards of credibility,” Amnesty concluded. Duterte’s spokesman, Salvador Panelo, said Amnesty’s basis for calling for an international investigation was wrong, and there were no such illegal killings.

Source: National Post July 08, 2019 08:03 UTC