A group of families of victims of the Philippines’ “war” on illegal drugs remembered the victims, and the women “who continue to fight for justice for their slain loved ones,” on Sunday, Mother’s Day.
“The lives of our dear children were gone so suddenly and far too early. Is anything more painful than this? There isn’t,” read a statement from the group “Rise Up for Life and For Rights.”
“We, mothers of those killed by the drug war, find strength together. We feel the need to support each other,” added the statement.
“In this time of pandemic, the hardships are even more, but we are also even more determined to fight. We continue to seek justice,” they said.
“Even if justice seems to be elusive for now, we will not lose hope that one day, someday, we will attain it. Justice will be served,” added the group’s statement.
In January this year, Human Rights Watch reported that the “drug war” killings intensified during the pandemic in 2020.
“The Duterte administration appeared to take advantage of COVID-19 curfews in 2020 to expand its gruesome and bloody ‘war on drugs,’” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.
“Drug war” killings in the Philippines in 2020 increased by more than 50 percent during the early months of the pandemic, read the World Report 2021 of Human Rights Watch.
The police reported in November that since President Rodrigo Duterte came to power in 2016, nearly 8,000 alleged drug suspects had been killed during police operations.
In June last year, the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights validated many of these killings.
Domestic human rights groups and the governmental Commission on Human Rights believe the actual toll is triple that figure.
