TRANSGENDER KILLING: DUTERTE PARDONS MARINE

MANILA, PHILIPPINES » President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines has pardoned a U. S. Marine convicted of killing a transgender woman, just days after his office blocked a court order to free the service member, the Philippine foreign secretary said Monday.

The decision to release the Marine, Lance Cpl. Joseph Scott Pemberton, angered both Philippine nationalist groups that oppose the country’s military agreements with the United States and advocates for gay and transgender rights who said that Duterte had shown leniency toward a hate crime.

Pemberton, then 20, was convicted of homicide in 2015 for the killing of Jennifer Laude, 26. He was sentenced to six to 12 years in prison — a term that was later reduced to 10 years — and has since been held at Camp Aguinaldo, the Philippine military headquarters in metropolitan Manila.

The foreign minister, Teodoro Locsin Jr., said on Twitter that to “do justice,” Duterte had granted an “absolute pardon,” effectively reducing the Marine’s sentence to time served.

Duterte defended his decision in a public address Monday.

“If there is a time when you are called upon to be fair, be fair,” he said.

Duterte’s spokesman, Harry Roque, who once served as counsel to Laude’s family, said that the president had taken the action in the interest of an “independent foreign policy where he is a friend to everyone, an enemy to none.”

The move could help mend relations with the United States.