THE Palace on Sunday urged the European Parliament to engage with the Philippine government as partners in nation-building, rather than accuse the administration of extrajudicial killings with no basis.
“We would rather that the European Parliament engage us as partners in nation-building, as the visionary EU business community seems to intend themselves,” said Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella in a statement.
His statement followed remarks from the European Union’s Ambassador to the Philippines, Franz Jessen, said that drug-related killings could imperil the country’s trade with Europe.
“The head of the task force on extrajudicial killings of the Commission on Human Rights, Commissioner Gwen Gana, has stated that their initial findings determined that the extrajudicial killings are not state-sponsored, Abella said.
“Non-trade accusations, especially if baseless and undeserved, should therefore not be linked with trade programs,” said Abella.
Abella said police are conducting legitimate law enforcement operations that require the observance of operational protocols. Police who breach procedures are answerable to the law, he added.
‘‘We assure our friends and allies that the Philippines will respect its international commitments,” said Abella.”©”©
“The President’s war against dangerous drug traffickers intends to protect the innocent which illegal drugs would destroy,” he said.
“The citizens appreciate the long awaited peace and order under President [Rodrigo] Duterte,” he added.
Earlier, Jessen had warned that trade with Europe would be affected if the Philippines continued to ignore warnings on human rights violations, including its bloody war on illegal drugs that has led to thousands of deaths blamed on the police and vigilantes.
Jessen said that Europe was not imposing United Nations conventions on the country, but was expecting it to abide by its international commitments.
“The Philippines has ratified and therefore ensured effective compliance with core UN international conventions including human rights and good governance,” Jessen said.
“So it’s not 27 conventions we are imposing on you. It’s 27 conventions that you already signed up for in the UN system. So it’s not us imposing anything. We are simply saying you did that [ratified UN conventions] and we think you did right and therefore we are very happy to work with GSP+ [Generalized Scheme of Preferences] in the Philippines,” he said.
Respect for international commitments remains a requirement in landing a free trade agreement with the European Union as well as continuing the EU’s GSP+. A European mission recently concluded an assessment and follow-up on the Philippines in January and February. A report is expected at the end of the year.
“We are monitoring the respect of these [UN] conventions by the Philippines and we will carefully consider what implications the findings might have for our trade engagement with the Filipinos,” he said.
Jessen’s statement came on the same day that President Rodrigo Duterte cursed the European Union as a “son of a whore” and “crazy” for believing claims made by rights groups that he had personally ordered the deaths of drug suspects.
He repeated his earlier claim that the European Union also suggested that he build a clinic that would dispense meth, heroin and cocaine—a charge the EU has denied.
“I said, ‘Come here and we’ll talk because I want to slap you,” Duterte said he told the European Union. His comments were made Friday at a Women’s Day gathering in Malacañang.
Jessen on Friday said he checked with EU member states represented in Manila and “nobody suggested anything like it was stated.”
“Whatever we do in this country is by definition in accordance with domestic law,” he said, adding that it was “simply not correct” to say that a representative of an EU country would have made any suggestion that was against local laws.
Jessen said the EU was nevertheless committed to “engage constructively” with Manila across a range of areas, from the health sector and law enforcement to the peace process, environment, disaster risk reduction and development specifically in Mindanao.
GSP+ has resulted in the reduction of tariff on 6,200 Philippine products to zero and helped the Philippines corner 17.5 percent in exports to the European Union worth $900 million in January.
Of this total, $225 million were exported under the GSP+ program.
Top Philippine exports to the European Union were agricultural oil products, electrical equipment, processed meat and fish, optical products, and processed vegetables, fruits and nuts.
Other GSP+ beneficiaries include Pakistan, Bolivia, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Cape Verde, Mongolia, Paraguay and Sri Lanka.
The EU had previously stopped preferential treatment for Sri Lankan imports due its failure to address reported human rights violations there. It only qualified in 2015 when the country’s new government carried out major reforms for national reconciliation there.
Jessen said that all GSP+ beneficiary countries were working to promote 27 UN conventions and were making steady progress.
“We are not expecting miracles here. We just expect a sort of steady progress over time that labor conditions will improve. That conditions for child labor will improve. That human rights conditions will improve. It’s not a question of what happened today, or what happened yesterday,” he said.
“But is a question of the right direction in accordance with the international commitments made by these partner-countries,” Jessen said.
He said that the European Union has a “tradition of being very frank and open” in discussions. He said the bloc considers the Philippines one of its oldest diplomatic partners.
Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III on Sunday slammed the EU for seeing only one side of the country’s war on illegal drugs—the side of the slain drug suspects.
In an interview over radio daBB, Sotto lamented that EU does not see the side of more than 77,000 people affected by illegal drugs.
“They pity the pushers or whoever were killed, but they do not pity those in just one year—the 77,000 addicts affected by pushers, the families who were hurt, those who were raped or illed, and all other cases [committed] under the influence of drugs,” Sotto said. With Macon Ramos-Araneta
