MANILA: A former police general who oversaw the bloodiest years of the Philippines’ war on drugs shrugged off the killing by police of a 3-year-old girl in a sting operation, saying on Thursday the world was not perfect and “shit happens”. Ronald dela Rosa, a senator who once led the crackdown that has killed thousands of mostly urban poor users and peddlers, said “collateral damage” was inevitable, referring to Sunday’s killing of toddler Myka Ulpina in a province near Manila.
Police said she was used as a human shield by her father, a suspected drug dealer who resisted arrest and opened fire. The girl’s mother has rejected that version of events. “We are living in an imperfect world,” dela Rosa told a news conference. “Would a police officer want to shoot a child? Never, because they have children as well. But shit happens during operations,” he said. Separately, more than two dozen countries formally called on Thursday for a United Nations investigation into President Rodrigo Duterte’s crackdown, according to activists.
Their draft resolution marks the first time that the Human Rights Council is being asked to address what 11 U.N. rights experts said last month was “a staggering number of unlawful deaths and police killings”, which the government had shown no interest in investigating. Duterte’s spokesman had called that “outrageous interference” by “foreign propagandists”. Duterte’s critics say his three-year-old campaign has been a failure, intended to create shock and fear and burnish his tough image without making a dent on big narcotics syndicates. (Agencies)
Comment