President Duterte says he will shoot criminals
MANILA — President Rodrigo Duterte has offered to shoot criminals himself, while warning he may bring police back to the frontlines of his deadly war on drugs.
Duterte made the comments late Friday following his announcement on October 11 to withdraw the police from his antidrug war after they were accused of rights abuses in killing thousands of people while following his orders to eradicate illegal drugs in society.
He replaced them with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), which has about 2,000 officers compared with 165,000 for the police force.
Duterte has repeatedly insisted he has not ordered or incited police to murder drug addicts or suspects, while at other times he has said he would be happy to slaughter them or have tens of thousands killed.
On Friday he said he would be prepared to kill criminals himself, as he raised doubts about the PDEA being able to contain illegal drugs. "Those who rape children, who rape women, those sons of ... if you don't want the police, I am here now. I will shoot them. That's true! If nobody would dare it, I will pull the trigger," he said.
Duterte said he was already considering bringing the police back to run the drug war. "Okay, let us see, six months from now. If things get worse again, I will say to these apes: 'Go back to this job. You solve this problem of ours,'" he said, referring to the police.
Asked for a reaction to Duterte's latest comments, PDEA Spokesman Derrick Arnold Carreon conceded the agency faced a tough battle and was prepared to stand aside for the police. "If the president so decides, we will welcome that," Carreon told AFP. "We are strained. Definitely it will be an uphill climb."