US official’s suggestion to tone down rhetoric earns more of the same from Duterte

From InterAksyon (Oct 25): US official’s suggestion to tone down rhetoric earns more of the same from Duterte

A suggestion by a visiting US Assistant Secretary of State to tone down the rhetoric only triggered more of the same from President Rodrigo Duterte as he launched another lengthy diatribe Tuesday against America and other critics of the government’s deadly war on drugs.

During a press conference before leaving on a three-day visit to Japan, Duterte skipped a question from a reporter on whether he would disclose the list of “narco-celebrities” submitted by Philippine National Police chief and went on to illustrate what he said was the extent of the country’s drug problem.

He then segued into a conversation he had with Foreign Secretary Perfecto Yasay on the latter’s meeting with Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Russel who, Duterte said, asked “if we can just turn down the rhetoric.”

Duterte then accused the US of starting the rift with the Philippines, referring back to the campaign period when Ambassador Philp Goldberg “said something not very nice” in reaction to a story the then presidential candidate told about how he should have been “first” with an Australian missionary who was raped and killed during a hostage crisis in Davao City, of which he was mayor for more than two decades.

He claimed that after he reacted to Goldberg, things spiraled “out of control” when the US allegedly “threatened me with imprisonment because of human rights violations” and with human rights experts, the State Department, President Barack Obama and the European Union joining the fray and threatening to “cut our assistance.”

He described the criticism and threats were an insult to the nation more than to him and stressed that he was not the lapdog of the US or any country.

Duterte also again cited historical atrocities committed by the Americans during their colonization of the country and accused them having “carpet-bombed Manila, not the Japs,” towards the end of World War II.

“Before we can move forward Mr. America, there are so many things” … “historical facts that will not go away,” that have to be resolved, he said.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/133662/us-officials-suggestion-to-tone-down-rhetoric-earns-more-of-the-same-from-duterte