State Department's report on human rights in Philippines inconsistent with Trump's stance: Palace
The US State Department report about the human rights situation in the Philippines is inconsistent with the position of US President Donald Trump, Malacanang said on Monday.
In a press briefing, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said he was "lost" on how to read the 2017 Human Rights Report, noting extrajudicial killings have been the "chief human rights concern" in the Philippines.
"I personally heard the discussion between President Trump and President Duterte when they were here in the Philippines during the ASEAN Summit and I think I heard words from President Trump praising President Duterte including the war on drugs," he said.
"If I’m not mistaken, President Trump said he knows what he’s doing in the Philippines ‘no. So I do not know how to reconcile the State Department report with the actual statement of the President," Roque added.
He also noted that the US State Secretary was recently changed.
"So I do not know how much input of the former Secretary of State had in drafting that final report," he said.
"But for now, we were going by the statements of President Trump that we all heard from the mouth of President Trump," the spokesman stressed.
The US report cited the sharp rise of extrajudicial killings in the Philippines with the onset of the anti-drug campaign in 2016 and which continued in 2017.
"Concerns about police impunity increase significantly following the sharp increase in police killings," it said. Celerina Monte/DMS
