Duterte claims he killed somebody
DA NANG, Vietnam – President Duterte has said he stabbed a person to death as a teenager in a defiant speech to promote his drug war ahead of the 31st Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit in Manila.
Speaking to the Filipino community here Thursday, Duterte also threatened to slap a United Nations rights rapporteur if he met her and used obscene language to hit back at critics of his deadly drugs crackdown.
"When I was a teenager, I would go in and out of jail. I'd have rumbles here, rumbles there," said Duterte, who is here for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit.
"At the age of 16, I already killed someone. A real person, a rumble, a stabbing. I was just 16years-old. It was just over a look. How much more now that I am President?"
Presidential spokesman Harry Roque Jr. said the President’s latest remarks were “made in jest.” The President uses colorful language when with Pinoys overseas, Roque said.
Duterte threatened to slap UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions Agnes Callamard if she pursues an investigation into his government’s anti-drug campaign.
The President said he “hates” Callamard and believes he would not be given a “fair hearing in case of an investigation into the alleged summary killings linked to his war on drugs.”
“Kaya sabi ko kay Callamard, kung imbestigahin mo ako, sampalin kita,” Duterte said.
He claimed that the UN envoy was incapable of leading a fair probe since she does not believe in the world body’s own research on the dangers of the narcotics use.
Duterte won last year's presidential elections after promising to eradicate illegal drugs with an unprecedented crackdown that would see up to 100,000 people killed.
Since he took office 16 months ago, police say they have killed 3,967 people in the crackdown. Another 2,290 people were murdered in drug-related crimes, while thousands of other deaths remain unsolved, according to government data.
Duterte, 72, remains popular with many Filipinos who believe he is making society safer. But critics at home and abroad warn that he is orchestrating a campaign of extrajudicial mass murder, carried out by corrupt police and hired vigilantes. Duterte denies the allegations.