Philippines' Duterte disowns list of drug suspects after mayor killed

MANILA, Dec 8 (Reuters) - Philippine President Rodrigo
Duterte distanced himself from a list of top drug suspects his
office made public last year after another mayor on that list
was killed last week, a move which Human Rights Watch denounced
as "cowardly".
Duterte in a late night address on Monday apologised to the
family of Caesar Perez, a town mayor who, according to the
police, was shot twice in the head by unidentified gunmen
Thursday night inside the town hall.
"That list is not mine. It is a collation. All that came
from intelligence reports of drug enforcement, police and
military," Duterte said.
"I'm sorry if your father was there. But really, most of
those (on the list) are into drugs. Your father might be an
exception," Duterte said.
Perez is not the first mayor on that list who had been
killed by unidentified gunmen. In October last year, a town
mayor in Mindanao was being transported by police to a
prosecutor's office in Cebu City, in the central Philippines,
when gunmen ambushed him and his police escorts.
Phil Roberston, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch,
said Duterte cannot now deny involvement in the violence
perpetrated against those on his lists, which "he has used as a
public, political prop for years to shore up his popularity."
"For him to disavow how these lists were used by law
enforcers to violate the civil liberties and human rights of
those listed is not only disingenuous – it is cowardly,"
Robertson said in a statement.
Duterte's office made public last year a list of
"narco-politicians," ahead of the May 2019 mid-term polls.
A United Nations report in June said tens of thousands of
people may have been killed in the drug war amid "near impunity"
for police and incitement to violence by top officials. The
government rejected that as baseless.