Manila ‘will not seek pardon for drug convicts in Mideast’
Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin said on Friday that he had instructed Philippine ambassadors in the Middle East to exclude convicted Filipino drug dealers from prisoner exchange programs and let the law of the host countries take its course. “I won't allow the pardon of convicted Filipino drug dealers in the Middle East,” Locsin said on his Twitter account.
“My orders to my ambassadors there is exclude drug dealers from prisoner exchanges.”
Echoing President Rodrigo Duterte's stand on drug offenders, he said: “You destroy my people I will . . . let the law abroad destroy you.” He stressed that unlike in Indonesia, Filipino drug dealers in the Middle East “were not fooled.” He was apparently referring to the case of Mary Jane Veloso, which made international headlines when the Philippine woman was sentenced to death by Indonesian authorities in 2010 for carrying 2.6 kilograms of heroin in her luggage. Veloso was scheduled to face the
firing squad in April 2015 but was given a last-minute stay of execution after an appeal by then Philippine President Benigno Aquino III. She denied knowledge about the heroin and insisted that she was tricked into carrying the drugladen luggage by her Philippinebased recruiter who promised her a job in neighboring Malaysia.
Senate President Vicente Sotto III, meanwhile, expressed his support for Locsin's stand on drug convicts. “Exactly my position when I was Dangerous Drugs Board chairman! Korek (correct)!” he said also in a Twitter post.
It was not immediately clear what prompted Locsin's statement, but the Department of Foreign Affairs, which he leads, was involved in a recent prisoner exchange with the UAE. Earlier this month, 95 Filipinos detained for various offenses in the UAE were released and allowed to return to the Philippines in exchange for two UAE nationals pardoned by Duterte.