Drug war death toll nears 3,000 mark

The number of individuals killed under the Duterte administration’s war on illegal drugs and other crimes is set to breach the 3,000 mark, barely three months after it was started in July.

As of yesterday morning, the number of fatalities stood at 2,956, including those who were killed in legitimate police operations and those who were killed by vigilante groups and other unidentified assailants, according to the records of the Philippine National Police (PNP).

Senior Supt. Dionardo Carlos, PNP spokesman, said a total of 1,466 were killed in the 17,389 police operations conducted across the country from July 1 to yesterday morning, the latest being the four suspected drug personalities killed in Quezon City on Friday.

The operations, he said, also resulted in the arrest of 16,025 suspected drug pushers and users.

“On the number of those who surrendered, it is now at 709,527 wherein 52,568 of them are suspected drug pushers while the rest are suspected drug users,” said Carlos, quoting data from various police regional offices.

It was learned that Metro Manila, Central Luzon and Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, Quezon) are among the regions with the most number of fatalities and arrested individuals.

A separate report, on the other hand, disclosed that there were 1,490 people killed which are under what the PNP refers to as Death Under Investigation or DUI.

Fatalities under the DUI include those whose cadavers were discovered with cardboards stating that the fatalities were either pushers or users.