Philippine strongman’s ‘Monica’ jibe at Chelsea
PHILIPPINE president Rodrigo Duterte taunted Chelsea Clinton about her father’s affairs as he tried to defend a remark he made about his troops raping women.
Mr Duterte called Miss Clinton a whore and asked how she felt ‘when your father was f****** Monica Lewinsky?’ during a speech.
Miss Clinton, daughter of former US president Bill Clinton, had attacked Mr Duterte for saying that he would take responsibility for crimes committed by soldiers under his recently imposed martial law, even if they ‘raped three women’.
‘Not funny,” Clinton commented on Twitter, before going on to respond to another user that ‘Duterte is a murderous thug with no regard for human rights. It’s important to keep pointing that out & that rape is never a joke.’
Yesterday Mr Duterte said that she was overreacting. In his speech he said: ‘These whores, they hear “rape”. Like Chelsea, she slammed me. I was not jok- ing, I was being sarcastic. Listen to the speech. I do not laugh at my own jokes.
‘I will tell her, when your father, the president of the United States, was f****** Lewinsky and the girls in the White House, how did you feel? Did you slam your father?’
Mr Duterte was referring to Bill Clinton’s infamous affair with a White House intern, which led to impeachment proceedings against him in 1999.
The Philippine president is a strongman known for his outspoken style that has drawn him praise from US president Donald Trump.
His war on drugs has slashed crime and boosted his popularity but human rights groups say that thousands are being killed by state-backed death squads. When the United Nations said the campaign was ‘a crime under international law’ he said he would pull out of the organisation.