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The Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) will deliver its judgment on July 18 on whether the Court can resume investigations into former president and Davao City mayor Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs and alleged death squad.

“On Tuesday, 18 July 2023, at 10:00 (The Hague local time), the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) will deliver, in open Court, its judgment on the appeal of the Philippines Government against ICC Pre-Trial Chamber I’s authorisation to resume the investigation of the Prosecutor,” the ICC said in a media advisory Wednesday, July 12.

It is a date earlier than expected. Rappler’s sources initially indicated the appeals decision will be handed down sometime September.

What the appeals chamber will decide is whether Prosecutor Karim Khan and his team are validly investigating the Philippine case. The appeal was filed by the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. government, particularly Solicitor General Menardo Guevarra.

In a message to Rappler on Friday, July 14, Guevarra, who serves as the Philippine government’s primary counsel, said he’s “not too sanguine about a favorable ruling” on the Philippine appeal against the probe. The solicitor general also noted that the decision of the appeals chamber would be final and not appealable under the Rome Statute. 

“The Philippine government, on the other hand, will also continue its own investigation and prosecution of alleged abuses in connection with the anti-illegal drug campaign, all in accordance with our own legal and judicial processes,” Guevarra said.

The Marcos government invoked, among others, the complementarity principle. Under this principle, the ICC should step aside if the national government is doing its own investigation into the issue. The Marcos government claims it is, while the human rights community, both at home and abroad, argues that the so-called local investigations are just for show and have not concretely achieved anything in the last three years.

If the appeals chamber validates the Prosecutor’s investigation, Khan and his team can move forward to their next step. That next step can be as simple as to continue gathering evidence, or as big as requesting for an arrest warrant or summons to be issued.

Who the warrant and summons will be for is still uncertain at this point, but Duterte has been mentioned frequently in past prosecutor and chamber reports. Duterte’s former police chief, now Senator Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa is a frequent mention too.

The Prosecutor has not stopped investigating even as the appeals process rolled. No member of the team has stepped foot in the Philippines since Duterte’s withdrawal from the ICC’s Rome Statute.

If the appeals chamber invalidates the investigation, “the prosecutor will have to close the investigation in the Philippines,” Human Rights Watch international justice counsel Maria Elena Vignoli told Rappler.

Whatever the judgment of the appeals chamber will be, victims of the killings and their families are cautioned to expect a protracted process that can last a little while longer. 

The investigation covers the six years of Duterte’s bloody drug war, where a high estimate of 27,000 people died both in police anti-drug and vigilante operations. A previous report by former prosecutor Fatou Bensouda indicated signs of a state policy that enabled killings and coverup. 

The investigation also covers the alleged Davao Death Squad when Duterte was mayor and vice mayor of Davao City. Retired Davao cop Arturo Lascañas, who claims that Duterte ordered killings by the squad, has been given limited immunity by the court. – With a report from Jairo Bolledo/ Rappler.com