Rodrigo Duterte attends ICC hearing in person for the first time
MANILA, Philippines – Former president Rodrigo Duterte, who’s facing three counts of crimes against humanity over his drug war, appeared in person during the third status conference hearing of his case at the International Criminal Court (ICC).
This was Duterte’s first in-person appearance, and his second overall after his online attendance during the ICC’s initial hearing on March 14, 2025.
Presiding Judge Joanna Korner mentioned Duterte’s attendance during the Wednesday hearing on September 16. ICC spokesperson Oriane Maillet confirmed this as well to Rappler.
As of writing, the ICC has yet to release official photos or videos of Duterte during the hearing.
Unlike in the first two status conferences, Duterte did not waive his appearance this time.
“To date, no waiver request has been made by the Defence publicly. The Chamber noted in the previous Status Conference that the accused would be expected to attend the Status Conference in September,” Maillet told Rappler.
“And for that, certainly, Mr. [Peter] Haynes, we would expect Mr. Duterte to be here unless there’s some medical issue,” Korner said on June 23.
Duterte has been detained in The Hague, Netherlands since 2025, and became the first former Philippine head of state to be arrested through an order by an international tribunal.
His case is currently at the trial stage after the pre-trial chamber, on April 23, confirmed all the three charges against the former president. A day before the pre-trial chamber’s decision on the confirmation of charges, the ICC Appeals Chamber also denied with finality Duterte’s jurisdiction appeal. This cleared the way for the trial.
Duterte’s full-blown trial will begin on November 30.
Massive evidence vs Duterte
During the hearing, Korner asked the prosecution if the number of witnesses could be lessened. She noted, for example, that there are four expert witnesses listed for the same topic.
Prosecution trial lawyer Edward Jeremy said they would need 193 hours to present their witnesses and explained that this is already the reduced version.
“We will look at every opportunity to streamline [the] case,” said Jeremy.
In total, the prosecution has 15,559 pieces of evidence. The prosecution’s senior trial lawyer Julian Nicholls said part of the evidence comes from a very large data set.
Nicholls added that so far, they were also having trouble settling agreed facts or stipulations. The parties — prosecution and defense — may agree to certain facts for a more streamlined and efficient trial.
Duterte’s lawyer, Peter Haynes, complained about the massive evidence and said it’s nearly 20,000.
He said the disclosure of evidence has been “awful,” adding that they only learned about the large disclosure six weeks before the end of disclosure.
Disclosure of evidence is done in the proceedings to allow the legal counsel of the accused to prepare a proper defense.
“[That’s] part of fair trial guarantees for the accused,” ICC assistant to counsel Ross Tugade told Rappler.
Haynes said they considered acquiring an artificial intelligence tool to sift through the evidence, but it would cost nearly half a million euros. He added that using keywords is applicable only to large data sets.
To settle the issue on disclosure, Korner gave the prosecution and the defense seven days each to file their respective positions. Korner added that she hopes the parties will “find some common ground” on how to handle the massive exhibits. – Rappler.com
