At least 45 people with suspected links to
drug trafficking have been killed in four
as president of the Philippines, according
to authorities.
ABS-CBN, the Philippines' largest TV
channel, reported on Monday that at least
29 drug and robbery suspects were killed
in Bulacan province, near the capital
Manila, since June 30, when Duterte took
over the presidency.
Authorities said the suspects resisted
arrest and shot at police officers.
Nine other killings were reported in
Manila.
Duterte won the election in May on a
platform of crushing crime. But his
rhetoric has alarmed many who hear
echoes of the country's authoritarian past.
After his oathtaking on Thursday, Duterte
said he wanted to get rid of drug
traffickers, telling supporters to "go ahead
and kill them yourself as getting their
parents to do it would be too painful".
Duterte's top police commander Ronald
dela Rosa also told officers accused of drug
links that he would not hesitate to change
their birthdays to November 2, referring to
the Day of the Dead, a major religious
holiday in Catholic Philippines.
In Manila, Oscar Albayalde, regional police
chief, said five drug dealers were killed
on Sunday in a gun battle with police in a
shantytown near the Malacanang
presidential residence.
"My men were about to serve arrest
warrants when shots rang out from one of
the houses in the area," Albayalde told
reporters, saying police returned fire and
killed five men.
Four guns and 200g of crystal
methamphetamine were recovered, police
added.
Two other men were shot dead in separate
sting operations in the Pasig district.
Two bodies were also found under a well-
known Manila bridge on Saturday
morning. Their faces were bound with
duct tape and their shirts bore signs in
Filipino saying "don't follow my example. I
am a pusher".
A local reporter posted a photo of the
bodies on Facebook.
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Elsewhere, at least six alleged drug dealers
and a policeman linked to drugs
syndicates were killed in six other
provinces across the country.
Media reports said more than 100 people
had already died, mostly suspected drug
dealers, rapists and car thieves since
Duterte's election on May 9.
Azadeh Shahshahani, a human rights
lawyer who has monitored rights abuses in
the Philippines, told Al Jazeera that the
killings set a "worrisome trend" in light of
the comments issued by Duterte.
"The president and his subordinates
should remember that the accused should
be afforded a fair process in an
independent court of law regardless of the
severity of the offence, per well-
established principles of international
law," Shahshahani, a director of the US-
based group Project South, said.
Edre Olalia, secretary-general of the
Manila-based National Union of People's
Lawyers, also said the killings must stop.
"The drug menace must stop. Yet the
apparent serial summary executions of
alleged street-drug users or petty-drug
lords which appear sudden, too contrived
and predictable must also stop," he said in
a statement to Reuters news agency.
"The two are not incompatible."
In the northern province of Cagayan,
officials said $19.23m worth of drugs from
either China or Taiwan were seized on
Monday.
The shipment was unloaded at sea and
brought to shore by small fishing boats
before delivery to Manila's Chinatown,
according to dela Rosa.
On Sunday, the communist armed group
New People's Army, issued a statement
supporting Duterte's all-out war against
drugs, saying it might conduct its own
drug operations against soldiers, police
and local officials.
All Credits :Aljazeera
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