Philippines ex-leader Duterte on plane to The Hague after arrest

A plane carrying the former president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte, has left Manila after the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a warrant accusing him of crimes against humanity over his deadly "war on drugs".

He was taken into police custody shortly after his arrival at the capital's international airport from Hong Kong on Tuesday morning.

Duterte, 79, contested his detention but within hours was on a chartered jet en route to The Hague in the Netherlands, where the ICC sits. Current President Ferdinand Marcos Jr said the country was meeting its legal obligations.

During Duterte's time in office, thousands of small-time drug dealers, users and others were killed without trial.

Marcos said his predecessor would face charges relating to what he described as Duterte's "bloody war on drugs".

"Interpol asked for help and we obliged," President Marcos told a press conference. "This is what the international community expects of us."

Duterte's daughter Sara, who said she would accompany him to The Hague, is vice president and a political rival of Marcos. She has said the arrest amounts to persecution.

Rodrigo Duterte has offered no apologies for his brutal anti-drugs crackdown, which saw more than 6,000 suspects killed when he was president from 2016 to 2022, and mayor of Davao city before that.

Nevertheless, he questioned the basis for the warrant, asking: "What crime [have] I committed?" in a video posted online on Tuesday by another daughter, Veronica Duterte.

"If I committed a sin, prosecute me in Philippine courts, with Filipino judges, and I will allow myself to be jailed in my own nation," he said in a later video.

In response to his arrest, a petition was launched on his behalf in the Supreme Court - urging it not to comply with the request.

According to a statement from the court's spokesperson, the former president also called for a declaration that the Philippines withdrawal from the ICC in 2019 "effectively terminated" its jurisdiction over the country and its people.

The ICC says it still has authority in the Philippines over alleged crimes committed before the country withdrew as a member.

• Duterte's downfall marks dramatic end to Philippines power struggle

Some of Duterte's supporters rallied at the airport compound, where the former president was taken following his arrest.

"I'm sad because I didn't think it would come to a point where he would be arrested. For me, he did a lot for our country and this is what they did to him," one supporter, Aikko Valdon, told the Reuters news agency.

State media said more than 370 police had been deployed to the airport and to other "key locations" to ensure peace was maintained.

While his supporters have criticised the arrest, activists have called it a "historic moment" for those who perished in his anti-drug war and their families, the International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (ICHRP) said.

"Duterte's arrest is the beginning of accountability for the mass killings that defined his brutal rule," said ICHRP chairman Peter Murphy.

The former leader had been in Hong Kong to campaign among the large Filipino diaspora there for the 12 May mid-term elections, in which he had planned to run again for mayor of Davao.

Duterte was arrested by police in Manila airport shortly after his arrival from Hong Kong

Duterte's arrest marks the "beginning of a new chapter in Philippine history", said political scientist Richard Heydarian. "This is about rule of law and human rights."

Heydarian added that authorities had arrested Duterte promptly instead of letting the matter take its course through the local courts to "avoid political chaos".

The Duterte and Marcos families formed a formidable alliance in the last elections in 2022, where against the elder Duterte's wishes, his daughter Sara ran as Marcos Jr's vice-president instead of seeking her father's post.

The relationship unravelled publicly in recent months as the two families pursued separate political agendas.

Marcos initially refused to co-operate with the ICC investigation, but as his relationship with the Duterte family deteriorated, he changed his stance.

The demand for justice in Duterte's drug war goes "hand in hand" with the political interests of President Marcos, Mr Heydarian said.

The 'war on drugs'

Duterte served as mayor of Davao, a sprawling southern metropolis, for 22 years and has made it one of the country's safest from street crimes.

He cast himself as a tough-talking anti-establishment politician to win the 2016 elections by a landslide.

With fiery rhetoric, he rallied security forces to shoot drug suspects dead. More than 6,000 suspects were killed by police or unknown assailants during the campaign, but rights groups say the number could be higher.

A previous UN report found that most victims were young, poor urban males and that police, who do not need search or arrest warrants to conduct house raids, systematically forced suspects to make self-incriminating statements or risk facing lethal force.

Critics said the campaign targeted street-level pushers and failed to catch big-time drug lords. Many families also claimed that the victims - their sons, brothers or husbands - were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Investigations in parliament pointed to a shadowy "death squad" of bounty hunters targeting drug suspects. Duterte has denied the allegations of abuse.

"Do not question my policies because I offer no apologies, no excuses. I did what I had to do, and whether or not you believe it... I did it for my country," Duterte told a parliament investigation in October.

"I hate drugs, make no mistake about it."

The ICC first took note of the alleged abuses in 2016 and started its investigation in 2021. It covered cases from November 2011, when Duterte was mayor of Davao, to March 2019, before the Philippines withdrew from the ICC.

Since taking power, Marcos has scaled back Duterte's anti-narcotics campaign and promised a less violent approach to the drug problem, but hundreds of drug-related killings have been recorded during his administration.

'Donald Trump of the East'

Duterte remains widely popular in the Philippines as he is the country's first leader from Mindanao, a region south of Manila, where many feel marginalised by the leaders in the capital.

He often speaks in Cebuano, the regional language, not Tagalog, which is more widely-spoken in Manila and northern regions.

When he stepped down in 2022, nearly nine in 10 Filipinos said they were satisfied with his performance as president - a score unseen among his predecessors since the restoration of democracy in 1986, according to the Social Weather Stations research institute.

His populist rhetoric and blunt statements earned him the moniker "Donald Trump of the East". He has called Russian President Vladimir Putin his "idol" and under his administration, the Philippines' pivoted foreign policy to China away from the US, its long-standing ally.

Marcos restored Manila's ties with Washington and criticised the Duterte government for being "Chinese lackeys" as the Philippines is locked in sea dispute with China.

China's foreign ministry said on Tuesday that it was "closely monitoring the development of the situation" and warned the ICC against "politicisation" and "double standards" in the arrest of Duterte.

His political heir, Sara, is tipped as a potential presidential candidate in 2028. The incumbent, Marcos, is barred by the constitution from seeking re-election.

Additional reporting by Virma Simonette in Manila and Kelly Ng in Singapore