THE much-awaited hearings on the confirmation of charges (COC) of crimes against humanity against former president Rodrigo Duterte at the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague, the Netherlands, from Feb. 23 to 27, 2026, drew a battery of journalists, diplomats, international and local media outlets around the globe, as well as foreign observers in the courtroom gallery.
Outside of the perimeter of the ICC were hundreds of Duterte’s Filipino supporters who came from many parts of the world braving the freezing cold temperatures to lend moral support to the ailing and much-admired former chief executive, fondly called “Tatay Digong.”
Filipino legal team for Duterte formed
In an interesting development, a Filipino legal team of lawyers consisting of former members of the Duterte Cabinet and government agency officials, namely, former executive secretary Salvador Medialdea, former labor secretary Silvestre Bello III, former Bureau of International Revenue commissioner Caesar Dulay, former Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. president Alfredo Lim, former Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board chairman Martin Delgra III, and this columnist (a former Duterte presidential spokesman and chief presidential legal counsel), that will assist the former president’s foreign defense team, was formed by the Duterte family, the creation and composition of which was officially announced by the Office of the Vice President on Feb. 22, a day before the start of the confirmation-of-charges hearing.
Prosecution’s submission rehash of false narratives
For the case to proceed to trial, the prosecution must prove the existence of substantial grounds to support the charges.
In what appears to be a rehash of the black propaganda against Duterte’s war on drugs by the latter’s detractors aided by a biased mainstream media, the prosecutors harped on the false narratives dished out by the Duterte haters and critics.
The prosecution team in its submission to the ICC judges quoted Duterte’s speeches that were delivered on different occasions containing fiery and inflammatory threats of killing criminals engaged in drug trafficking. It also presented a memorandum circular signed by former Philippine National Police (PNP) chief, now senator Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa, directing then-PNP members to go after and neutralize suspected drug-engaged criminals. It argued that the word “neutralize” was a euphemism or code word for “kill.”
The prosecutors argued that the speeches of Duterte showed his “murderous intent” in killing those involved in drug-related crimes. It tried to convince the pretrial chamber judges that Duterte’s speeches together with the then-PNP chief’s circular to “neutralize” the targeted criminals showed a commonality of “murderous intent” between Duterte and the PNP to put into effect the state policy of the then-president to kill thousands of drug traffickers, users and drug lords.
The prosecution put forward as proof of Duterte’s masterminding extrajudicial killings (EJKs) the circumstance that the former president made public a list of a thousand or more individuals engaged in drug trafficking with accompanying threat of killing them, and the succeeding fact that two prominent personalities included on the list were killed while in detention.
To buttress their claim that Duterte ordered those EJKs, the ICC prosecutors offered the sworn statements of those who participated in executing the order to kill. They added that they were members of the “Davao Death Squad” created by the ex-president to implement his alleged program of killing them. They offered as proof his purported “admission” in a Senate investigation that he indeed formed the death squad.
One private lawyer of the alleged victims of EJK pontificated nonlegal arguments — saying the millions of fanatical followers of Duterte are clones of the latter infected with a “virus of impunity” and should be “vaccinated with truth,” while the other lawyer made an emotional appeal pleading that the sufferings of the grieving and anguished relatives of the victims can only be assuaged by confirming the charges and for Duterte to face trial and be convicted for crimes against humanity.
Prosecution case shattered to pieces
The foreign defense team, led by British-Israeli lawyer Nicholas Kaufman, made mincemeat of the prosecution’s submission. It crushed the prosecution’s pretenses on the imagined direct link between Duterte and the perpetrators of the crimes charged against the former.
The defense team exposed the prosecution’s deliberate cherry-picking of Duterte’s public utterances, choosing only the salacious parts and deliberately omitting the exculpatory or exonerating parts of the speeches. While the earlier part of the former president’s speeches thundered on his threats against the drug syndicates, users and traffickers, the latter portion pounded on the strict adherence to police protocols and rules of engagement in executing drug-related police operations with the repeated reminder that the police officers should only use lethal violence on the suspected criminals if the latter in resisting arrest would place the police enforcers in grave danger.
The defense team demolished the claim of the prosecution that the memorandum circular of Dela Rosa was a command to the police operatives to kill those suspected or perceived involved in drug trafficking. The very document itself contains directives that commanded the police officers to effect arrest in accordance with the law.
Kaufman pounded the last nail in the coffin of the prosecution’s case by completely destroying the credibility of the prosecution’s vaunted witnesses by exposing the contradictions by and between them in their sworn statements. One witness was shown to be contradicting himself in the manner of killing his victim. In a statement, he said he killed the victim with a knife but in a subsequent sworn declaration he said he shot the victim with his gun.
Kaufman educated the prosecution on the inadmissibility of the witnesses’ testimonies owing to their being hearsay and double hearsay — apart from coming from unreliable self-confessed murderers.
The existence of the so-called Davao Death Squad was exposed to be a media-created fiction. This columnist was seated beside Duterte during the Senate investigation, appearing as his lawyer. No such admission was made. He said it was the criminals who were killing each other; they were the death squad.
There was a vigorous attempt by the prosecution to redeem itself in the final summation, but it dismally failed as it was beyond salvaging.
Only biased, prejudiced court will not dismiss charges
On the basis of utter lack of substantial ground, as in fact there is not even a scintilla of a believable ground, the charges against Duterte should be dismissed by the ICC pretrial chamber.
Only a biased and prejudiced court will not dismiss the charges.
But given the circumstances, e.g, the ICC forcibly acquiring jurisdiction over our country and over the person of Duterte, not just in violation of our Constitution, but also in blatant disregard of the principle of complementarity in the Rome Statute, and the fact that the pretrial chamber conducted the confirmation-of-charges hearing despite a pending appeal on the issue of jurisdiction, giving the logical inference that the chamber has prejudged the case, there is reasonable reason not to be optimistic about the outcome of the just-concluded proceedings.