UN On Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte
Note to Correspondents: United Nations Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide expresses alarm at public comments by Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte
New
York, 30 September 2016 - The Special Adviser on the
Prevention of Genocide, Adama Dieng, expressed alarm at
public comments by President Rodrigo Duterte of the
Philippines, in which he reinforced a campaign to kill
millions of drug addicts in the Philippines and compared it
to the massacre of millions of Jews by Hitler during the
Holocaust in Nazi Germany during World War II.
Adama
Dieng qualified such a statement as deeply disrespectful of
the right to life of all human beings. He reminded that the
Holocaust was one of the darkest periods of the history of
humankind and that any glorification of the cruel and
criminal acts committed by those responsible was
unacceptable and offensive. He added that such statement was
also undermining the efforts of the international community
to develop strategies to prevent the recurrence of those
crimes, to which all countries around the world should be
committed to.
The Special Adviser on the Prevention of
Genocide called upon President Rodrigo Duterte to exercise
restraint in the use of language that could exacerbate
discrimination, hostility and violence and encourage the
commission of criminal acts which, if widespread or
systematic, could amount to crimes against humanity. He also
requested the President of the Philippines to support the
investigation of the reported rise of killings in the
context of the anti-crime and anti-drug campaign targeting
drug dealers and users to ascertain the circumstances of
each
death.