Duterte aching to lecture US official on human rights

DAVAO CITY – Mayor Rodrigo Duterte is aching to give a US State Department official a "beating" and some lessons in human rights if he shows up in the city as part of his scheduled Philippine visit next month.

Duterte said yesterday Eric John, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs, was interfering in the internal affairs of the country when he scored the Arroyo administration for the spate of unexplained killings of journalists and militants.

"Let him (John) come here and I will give him a ‘beating.’ I will teach him human rights," the mayor said in his weekly "Gikan sa Masa, Para sa Masa" TV program yesterday.

John is set to visit the country next month to look deeper into the rising cases of rights violations involving government security forces and anti-communist militias. It was not immediately known if Davao would be included in John’s itinerary.

"It is bullshit to me. It is interfering in the sovereignty of the Philippines," Duterte said of John’s fact-finding mission.

Duterte said the US should first look at its own human rights record before finding fault with other countries’ rights situation.

"The US is the No. 1 human rights violator. They torture prisoners and you call them clean? They are hypocrites," the mayor said.

He said the US occupation of Iraq unleashed a wave of rights violations by American soldiers and that the justification for the invasion, which was Iraq’s alleged stockpiling of weapons of mass destruction, turned out to be a lie.

"The US destroyed a country like Iraq. Look at what is happening to Iraq now with thousands of innocent people, including children getting killed, and you are talking about human rights violations?" the mayor said.

Duterte also slammed the US government for spiriting out of the Philippines suspected Central Intelligence Agency agent Michael Meiring without informing the local government officials here, after he reportedly accidentally detonated a bomb inside his hotel room here in May 2002.

"You (Americans) planted a bomb here that exploded right in the face of your citizen and yet you whisked him off, away from legal prosecution and you have the gall to force human rights issue on us?"

The mayor also questioned the timing of the investigations of the killings conducted by various international groups, including the United Nations and the US Senate. "What is the reckoning? What is the time frame?" he asked.

He said he knew right away that UN special rapporteur Philip Alston would be biased against the Arroyo administration in his assessment of the country’s human rights record just by looking at the UN representative’s resumé. "I knew right then and there what would be his conclusion given his background and credentials," the mayor said, without elaborating on how he arrived at such judgment. Duterte was among those summoned to meet Alston. The UN rapporteur held the Arroyo administration responsible for the more than 800 political killings.

Duterte also called on the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing the New People’s Army to own up to the numerous unexplained killings.

"You communists, you must also admit that you have also killed many people. Do not blame government, the military and the police for everything. You also have your own share of killings. Be honest about it. Admit it," he said.

Davao City is no stranger to political strife. In the 1980s up to the early 1990s, anti-communist vigilante groups and rebel hit squads operated in the city with impunity, with many innocent civilians as victims.