In the resolution adopted on April 19, 2018, the European Parliament strongly condemns all extrajudicial killings, effectively murders carried out by the authorities and justified by falsified evidence, and calls for their immediate end. They also denounce the violent crackdown in the name of terror, calling on the authorities to remove human rights defenders from their terrorist list, also recalling the obligation to protect the human rights of indigenous peoples. The EP resolution further urges the government to stop the reintroduction of death penalty, warning this goes against their international obligations, including the GSP+ scheme and Partnership and Cooperation Agreement, as previously detailed in FIDH’s contribution to the mid-term evaluation of the EU GSP.
FIDH, through its Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, has systematically denounced the unfounded terrorist accusations against dozens of human rights defenders and, in a fact-finding mission in August 2017, called out a warning about extra-judicial killings under President Rodrigo Duterte as part of his ‘war on drugs’. In the face of the overall brutal crackdown, the International Criminal Court opened preliminary examinations https://www.fidh.org/en/issues/international-justice/international-criminal-court-icc/in-the-face-of-brutal-crackdowns-the-international-criminal-court into the Philippines on February 8, 2018.