Duterte Waives Right to Appear at Upcoming ICC Confirmation of Charges Hearing

Rodrigo Duterte, the former Philippine president whose six-year tenure was defined by a bloody, state-sanctioned campaign against narcotics, has formally requested to remain in his cell rather than face the judges of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. In a signed letter submitted through his legal counsel, the 80-year-old former leader sought to waive his right to attend a critical confirmation of charges hearing scheduled for late February, a move that serves as a final, defiant rejection of a tribunal he has long characterized as a tool of Western imperialism. The request, which arrives as the court prepares to weigh the evidence of crimes against humanity, marks a transition for the man who once famously dared the international community to come and get him. Now in custody following what he describes as a politically motivated rendition in March 2025, Mr. Duterte appears content to let his lawyers contest the prosecution's narrative while he remains secluded from the global stage he once dominated with populist fervor. The proceedings, slated for February 23 to 27, are designed to determine whether the Office of the Prosecutor has amassed sufficient evidence to warrant a full trial. For the victims of the Philippine drug war and the human rights advocates who have spent years documenting thousands of extrajudicial killings, the hearing represents a long-awaited moment of institutional reckoning. Yet for Mr. Duterte, the process is an illegitimate exercise in judicial overreach. In his communication to Pre-Trial Chamber I, he framed his potential transfer to the Netherlands as a fundamental violation of Philippine sovereignty and a breach of the national constitution. He described his arrest as a kidnapping orchestrated by the administration of his successor, a claim that underscores the deep and bitter schism currently defining Philippine domestic politics. Beyond the philosophical and legal objections to the court’s jurisdiction, the former president’s request is grounded in the inescapable reality of his own physical decline. In the prose of a man who once projected an image of indomitable machismo, Mr. Duterte described himself as old, tired, and frail. His legal team, led by the veteran attorney Nicholas Kaufman, has bolstered this request with medical evaluations suggesting that the former leader suffers from impaired cognitive functions and a significant loss of linguistic fluency. The defense argues that the intricacies of international jurisprudence would be lost on a defendant who might forget the substance of a legal argument within minutes of its delivery. This portrait of a diminished strongman contrasts sharply with the figure who, for years, presided over a national policy that transformed the streets of Manila and Davao into sites of frequent and lethal police intervention. The prosecution’s case rests on the allegation that Mr. Duterte acted as an indirect co-perpetrator in a widespread and systematic attack against civilians. The charges suggest that the drug war was not merely a series of rogue police actions, but a centrally coordinated effort to eliminate perceived social enemies through extrajudicial means. Mr. Duterte has consistently dismissed these allegations as an outrageous lie promulgated by his political adversaries, maintaining that he never authorized murder, but rather the lawful enforcement of the state’s will against the scourge of addiction. The legal architecture of the Rome Statute allows a suspect to waive their right to be present at this phase of the litigation. Should the court accept the waiver, the hearing will proceed in absentia, with Mr. Kaufman representing the former president’s interests. Legal observers suggest that this strategy may be an attempt to deny the court the visual and symbolic satisfaction of seeing a former head of state in the dock, thereby casting the proceedings as a sterile administrative exercise rather than a moral trial of his legacy. It is a gamble that allows Mr. Duterte to maintain his posture of non-recognition while his defense attempts to dismantle the prosecution’s evidentiary bridge before it can reach a full trial. The International Criminal Court’s persistence in this matter rests on the principle that withdrawal from the treaty does not grant immunity for crimes committed while a nation was a signatory. The Philippines formally exited the court in 2019 at Mr. Duterte’s behest, but the events under scrutiny—the thousands of deaths that occurred during his first years in office—remain within the court’s temporal jurisdiction. As the February hearing approaches, the silence of Mr. Duterte’s empty chair in The Hague will likely speak as loudly as any testimony. To his supporters at home, his absence will be viewed as a final act of patriotic resistance against an intrusive global order. To his critics, it is the retreat of a man who can no longer defend his actions in the light of day. Regardless of the court’s decision on his attendance, the momentum of the case suggests that the legacy of the Duterte administration is no longer his to control, but is now in the hands of a judicial process he spent a lifetime attempting to outpace. ©KuryenteNews