Philippines: The seat of the Human Rights Council justifies its policies

MANILA (Reuters) – The UN Human Rights Council has received a new three-year term in the Philippines. The chairman of the Human Rights Council, Rodrigo Duterte, said his detractors were "corrupt morally," his foreign minister said Saturday.

Human rights activists have said Duterte's drug crackdown after taking office in June 2016 – since the police killed more than 4,800 people – has made his government unfit to occupy a seat .

But the Philippines was re-elected to the 47-seat secret ballot at the United States General Assembly on Friday.

"We are truly honored because it is clear that false news and unfounded accusations have no place in modern human rights discussions," said Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano in a statement.

"We thank human rights defenders around the world, but also condemn some who are morally corrupt and use human rights for political and financial ends," he said. he declares.

The Philippines won 165 votes out of 193, with one abstention, to win a new term beginning January 1, 2019, according to a statement from the United Kingdom posted on its website.

Duterte is the subject of two complaints to the International Criminal Court that charge him with crimes against humanity for drug-related murders. Prior to the vote, Human Rights Watch said the record of "flagrant" rights in the Philippines made it unfit to serve on the council.

Congressman Gary Alejano, one of Duterte's fiercest critics, called the Philippine re-election a "great irony".

"A country that has many cases of human rights violations has no place in the Council," he said in a statement.

Duterte's government denied that the police were exterminating drug users, claiming that all those killed were resellers who had resisted the arrest.

Last month, Duterte appeared to acknowledge his responsibility for extrajudicial executions, but his spokesman said the remarks were "playful" and misinterpreted.