Duterte's ICC arrest is a victory for a faltering rules-based order

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/03/12/icc-arrest-duterte-philippines-authoritarianism/

by suraci • 1 year ago

49 16 1 year ago

jisnsm• 1 year ago

Western democracies have resigned themselves, perhaps by design, to leaving the poor vulnerable to criminals. I have no idea why this is, maybe sadism. Forcing the vulnerable to live a life where they have to worry for their personal security and for the security of their property is something these democracies will fight tooth and nail for. And that’s also their most successful cultural export, perhaps after Coca Cola.

rurban• 1 year ago

You cannot talk about a victory when most US-based or supported war criminals are still free. They don't care about the ICC as Duterte did not.

Brazil's ex-military still not in prison e.g. And all the US presidents or CIA leaders roaming free. Certainly not a victory.

Pet_Ant• 1 year ago

I think it is fair to point out. George Bush helped erode the rules based order with the Iraq war. The US has always refused to accept anything that would limit exercising it's power.

JumpCrisscross3• 1 year ago

George Bush helped erode the rules based order with the Iraq war

The original sin was NATO—a defensive alliance—bombing Yugoslavia. Iraq was just a WTF cherry on top. That said, we didn’t annex anything, which the norm Russia toppled in Ukraine. Though now Trump and his supporters appear keen to make Iraq look milquetoast.

Teever• 1 year ago

I bet that Duterte's victims would consider it a victory.

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

JumpCrisscross3• 1 year ago

We aren’t party to the Rome Statute [1].

Our refusal to coöperate with the ICC doesn’t undermine the rules-based international order, which is first and foremost based on a notion of state sovereignty. It undermines the international human rights project (that admittedly seems to be dead).

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rome_Statute

aaron695• 1 year ago

Duterte was well supported by the people in a democracy and saved far more lives than killed and nothing was hidden from the people.

In a war no one would think twice.

Hopefully the ICC is defunded soon, Duterte might have not been right, maybe the right thing was to allow the killing ( and rapes and violent crimes ) to continue and slowly try and stop it against the will of the people. Morally maybe it's better to let thousands of innocents die.

The international community should not have been involved. It's corruption from opposition parties here. It seems most international organisations have become bureaucratic and corrupt tools for external groups.

pull_my_finger2• 1 year ago

Totally ridiculous take. Duterte didn't stop drugs or rape at all. He condoned and decriminalized vigilantism and mob killings. Police abuse of powers was wildly out of control, and the cities were full of motorbike riding assassins. People were literally getting killed in the street and left with a sign claiming they were "pusher"s. During that time, he also attacked journalists who reported negatively and opposition politicians. There was a large sentiment suggesting the government/police force was INVOLVED in the drug trafficking even.

It was a horrible time in the Philippines and even worse, you can draw a LOT of parallels between his campaign and time in office to Trumps. Both used Cambridge Analytica data to manipulate voters on social media (and traditional media) and had "troll armies" on social media, both ran on populist/disestablishment platforms, both very "macho" and Duterte said horrible stuff that his press secretary pawned off as "Bisaya humor", where Trump did the same thing and pawned it off as "locker room talk". Trump cozies up to Putin just like Duterte cozied up to Xi Jinping even as he was encroaching in the West Philippine Sea. Duterte had his "oplan tokhong" targeting drug users (he said they were raping babies), where Trump has his ICE people going after brown people (he said they're eating peoples dogs). Both also wanted to alter their constitutions to allow longer terms for themselves.

If you put your tinfoil hat on for a moment, you could probably make a convincing argument that Duterte's presidency was like a pilot program for Trump's.

googlehater2• 1 year ago

To add some context from the other side:

- "Additionally, polling firm PUBLiCUS Asia reported in Duterte's last month in office that Duterte received a 75% approval for his entire six-year tenure, making him the most popular post-EDSA president"

- The murder rate halved under his administration: https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/PHL/phi...

I am completely against killing people without due process, as he did, and bragged about. But it does seem that most people in the Philippines were happy with his policies, and his policies do appear to be "effective" wrt murder, though are extrajudicial killings by police any better? I don't think so

tycho-newman• 1 year ago

Can’t get Putin or Netanyahu. So get who you can!

simianwords• 1 year ago

I genuinely feel like this is bullying. Saudi does way more harm in this sense but you never see the same treatment to them do you? Where does this analogy break?

Duterte's ICC arrest is a victory for a faltering rules-based order

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