Latest news with #drugwar
Al Jazeera
6 days ago
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
A Filipino priest's fight for justice for victims of Duterte's drug war
101 East follows the Catholic priest taking on former Filipino President Rodrigo Duterte for alleged 'drug war' crimes. Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's 'war on drugs' killed thousands of people. For years, Catholic priest Flaviano Villanueva has gathered evidence of alleged extrajudicial killings. He exhumed victims' bodies for forensic examination and protected a key witness who claims he worked as a contract killer for Duterte. In March 2025, the priest's persistence paid off when Duterte was arrested and extradited to The Hague to face charges of crimes against humanity before the International Criminal Court. 101 East follows Father Villanueva's fight for justice for the victims of Duterte's brutal crackdown.
Al Jazeera
16-07-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
AI and disinformation fuel political rivalries in the Philippines
Manila, Philippines – When former Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte was arrested by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in March, Sheerah Escuerdo spoke to a local television station, welcoming the politician's detention on charges of murder linked to his war on drugs. Escuerdo, who lost her 18-year-old brother, Ephraim, to Duterte's war, clutched a portrait of her sibling during the interview with News 5 Everywhere as she demanded justice for his killing. Days later, she was shocked to find an AI-generated video of her slain brother circulating on Facebook, in which he said he was alive and accused his sister of lying. 'I'm alive, not dead. Are they paying you to do this?' the computer-generated image of Ephraim said. The video, posted online by a pro-Duterte influencer with 11,000 followers, immediately drew thousands of views on Facebook. One of the comments read, 'Fake drug war victims'. It was Escudero and her brother's image from her News 5 Everywhere interview that the influencer had used to falsify their family's tragedy. The video has since been reposted countless times, spreading to other social media platforms and resulting in Duterte supporters hounding Escuerdo daily. 'I wake up to hundreds of notifications and hate messages,' she told Al Jazeera. 'The worst thing is reading comments of people who believe this is real!' she added. The same kind of harassment has been levelled at other vocal drug war victims, especially those under the group Rise Up, who actively campaigned for the ICC's intervention. Duterte's arrest in March came amid a bitter power struggle between the ex-leader and his former ally, the incumbent president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Their alliance collapsed last year due to disagreements over policy, including Marcos Jr's courting of the United States. The president's supporters are now leading an effort to impeach Duterte's daughter, Sara, from her post as the country's vice president. As tensions have escalated, supporters of Duterte and Marcos Jr have stepped up digital smear campaigns, using disinformation. Apart from fake accounts and doctored images, the disinformation mix has noticeably included AI-generated content. Both the Marcos Jr and Duterte clans have been known to deploy disinformation tactics. Marcos Jr won the election in 2022 following a disinformation campaign that sought to whitewash his father Ferdinand Marcos's brutal rule during the 70s and 80s. But fact-checkers and experts say the recent uptick in posts peddling false narratives can be attributed more to the Duterte camp. Disinformation nation Victims of the drug war, their families, supporters and even their lawyers say incessant online disinformation has targeted them. In a statement, the National Union of People's Lawyers (NUPL), which represents Rise Up, a group of drug war victims, said the 'online hate' was being 'directed at widows, mothers, and daughters of drug war victims, attempting to intimidate them into silence'. Both NUPL and Rise Up have now formally requested the government to investigate the increasing online harassment. The campaign by Duterte's supporters aims to discredit the ICC, demonise their detractors and paint their family as persecuted victims leading to and after the May 2025 mid-term polls, according to Danilo Arao, mass media expert and convener of election watchdog Kontra-Daya. 'The Duterte camp aims to deodorize the image of both patriarch and daughter. They will resort to disinformation to get what they want, even if it means twisting certain data,' Arao told Al Jazeera. He pointed to posts circulating online that the ICC consented to grant Duterte's request for an interim release, which in reality was denied. The surge in disinformation has caused worry among Filipinos. A report released in June by Reuters Digital News found that a record number of Filipinos – nearly 7 out of 10 – were more concerned with disinformation than ever before. In the same month, Duterte-allied senator, Ronald Dela Rosa, shared an AI-generated video on his official Facebook page. The video, which showed a young man criticising the 'selective justice' targeting Sara Duterte, was posted on June 14, garnering at least 8.6 million views before it was taken down. The vice president defended the video, saying there's 'no problem sharing an AI video supporting me as long as it's not for profit'. Arao, the mass media expert, countered, saying the politician is trying to normalise disinformation, and that she 'badly needs media literacy'. the Philippines' pioneer fact-checking coalition, noted that fact checks on posts about Duterte's ICC arrest over a six-week-period account for almost a quarter of the 127 news articles curated by the group. The figure surpasses the two dozen pieces of news related to Sara Duterte's impeachment. On Sara Duterte's deepfake defence, coordinator Professor Rachel Khan told Al Jazeera that 'for the educated, it reinforces their already tainted image of disregarding truth. But for followers, it could reinforce the dictum that 'perception is truth.'' In reality, the popularity of the Duterte family has waned significantly. Opinion and approval surveys conducted in March indicate that at least 51 percent of the public want Rodrigo Duterte to be tried for his alleged crimes. Likewise, polls in June found that at least 66 percent of people want Sara Duterte to confront allegations of corruption against her through an impeachment process. AI growth The government of last year launched a task force to mitigate disinformation and the use of AI. However, spikes in disinformation were already noticeable in December as the Marcos-Duterte rivalry heated up. tracked the increasing use of AI in disinformation before the mid-term elections held in May this year. It found that from February to May, out of 35 unique altered claims, nearly a third 'likely involved deepfake technology to impersonate public figures or distort reality'. 'This is a problem of human behaviour, not AI. It's a disinformation influence operations problem, exacerbated by the unethical usage of AI tools,' Carljoe Javier, executive director of Data and AI Ethics PH, told Al Jazeera. All mainstream political forces in the Philippines have, to some extent, deployed AI technologies to boost their agendas. The latest OpenAI Safety Report revealed that Comm&Sense, a Manila-based tech firm, used AI for a campaign using thousands of pro‑Marcos Jr and anti‑Duterte comments across Facebook and TikTok. Besides generating content, the firm also used AI to analyse political trends and even draft public relations strategies. The report said Comm&Sense manufactured TikTok channels to post identical videos with variant captions while handling shell accounts to post comments and boost engagement. The use of AI to outline plans, not just create content, marks a shift away from the Marcos Jr administration employing troll armies as he did in his 2022 campaign. 'If you have the resources and the bully pulpit of the government, you can afford to keep on swatting the Dutertes and their partisans for whatever statements they have made against the Marcos government,' said Joel Ariate Jr, a researcher tracking political developments at the University of the Philippines Third World Studies Center. 'If you put AI in the hands of an already good public relations or marketing team, the capacity for disinformation is amplified by so much. They can have one message and instantly generate 20 different versions of it,' explained Javier. The Philippines has several pieces of legislation in congress concerning the responsible use of AI. For a healthy policy approach, Javier believes that technical and ethical experts would be crucial. He said he hoped the country's leaders can take important steps, but said he has doubts about their appetite for ethical AI legislation. 'Is there enough push for legislators to advance a policy given that they may be benefitting from the current state of political operations?' he asked.
Al Jazeera
15-07-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
AI and disinformation prompt political rivalries in the Philippines
Manila, Philippines – When former Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte was arrested by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in March, Sheerah Escuerdo spoke to a local television station, welcoming the politician's detention on charges of murder linked to his war on drugs. Escuerdo, who lost her 18-year-old brother, Ephraim, to Duterte's war, clutched a portrait of her sibling during the interview with News 5 Everywhere as she demanded justice for his killing. Days later, she was shocked to find an AI-generated video of her slain brother circulating on Facebook, in which he said he was alive and accused his sister of lying. 'I'm alive, not dead. Are they paying you to do this?' the computer-generated image of Ephraim said. The video, posted online by a pro-Duterte influencer with 11,000 followers, immediately drew thousands of views on Facebook. One of the comments read, 'Fake drug war victims'. It was Escudero and her brother's image from her News 5 Everywhere interview that the influencer had used to falsify their family's tragedy. The video has since been reposted countless times, spreading to other social media platforms and resulting in Duterte supporters hounding Escuerdo daily. 'I wake up to hundreds of notifications and hate messages,' she told Al Jazeera. 'The worst thing is reading comments of people who believe this is real!' she added. The same kind of harassment has been levelled at other vocal drug war victims, especially those under the group Rise Up, who actively campaigned for the ICC's intervention. Duterte's arrest in March came amid a bitter power struggle between the ex-leader and his former ally, the incumbent president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Their alliance collapsed last year due to disagreements over policy, including Marcos Jr's courting of the United States. The president's supporters are now leading an effort to impeach Duterte's daughter, Sara, from her post as the country's vice president. As tensions have escalated, supporters of Duterte and Marcos Jr have stepped up digital smear campaigns, using disinformation. Apart from fake accounts and doctored images, the disinformation mix has noticeably included AI-generated content. Both the Marcos Jr and Duterte clans have been known to deploy disinformation tactics. Marcos Jr won the election in 2022 following a disinformation campaign that sought to whitewash his father Ferdinand Marcos's brutal rule during the 70s and 80s. But fact-checkers and experts say the recent uptick in posts peddling false narratives can be attributed more to the Duterte camp. Disinformation nation Victims of the drug war, their families, supporters and even their lawyers say incessant online disinformation has targeted them. In a statement, the National Union of People's Lawyers (NUPL), which represents Rise Up, a group of drug war victims, said the 'online hate' was being 'directed at widows, mothers, and daughters of drug war victims, attempting to intimidate them into silence'. Both NUPL and Rise Up have now formally requested the government to investigate the increasing online harassment. The campaign by Duterte's supporters aims to discredit the ICC, demonise their detractors and paint their family as persecuted victims leading to and after the May 2025 mid-term polls, according to Danilo Arao, mass media expert and convener of election watchdog Kontra-Daya. 'The Duterte camp aims to deodorize the image of both patriarch and daughter. They will resort to disinformation to get what they want, even if it means twisting certain data,' Arao told Al Jazeera. He pointed to posts circulating online that the ICC consented to grant Duterte's request for an interim release, which in reality was denied. The surge in disinformation has caused worry among Filipinos. A report released in June by Reuters Digital News found that a record number of Filipinos – nearly 7 out of 10 – were more concerned with disinformation than ever before. In the same month, Duterte-allied senator, Ronald Dela Rosa, shared an AI-generated video on his official Facebook page. The video, which showed a young man criticising the 'selective justice' targeting Sara Duterte, was posted on June 14, garnering at least 8.6 million views before it was taken down. The vice president defended the video, saying there's 'no problem sharing an AI video supporting me as long as it's not for profit'. Arao, the mass media expert, countered, saying the politician is trying to normalise disinformation, and that she 'badly needs media literacy'. the Philippines' pioneer fact-checking coalition, noted that fact checks on posts about Duterte's ICC arrest over a six-week-period account for almost a quarter of the 127 news articles curated by the group. The figure surpasses the two dozen pieces of news related to Sara Duterte's impeachment. On Sara Duterte's deepfake defence, coordinator Professor Rachel Khan told Al Jazeera that 'for the educated, it reinforces their already tainted image of disregarding truth. But for followers, it could reinforce the dictum that 'perception is truth.'' In reality, the popularity of the Duterte family has waned significantly. Opinion and approval surveys conducted in March indicate that at least 51 percent of the public want Rodrigo Duterte to be tried for his alleged crimes. Likewise, polls in June found that at least 66 percent of people want Sara Duterte to confront allegations of corruption against her through an impeachment process. AI growth The government of last year launched a task force to mitigate disinformation and the use of AI. However, spikes in disinformation were already noticeable in December as the Marcos-Duterte rivalry heated up. tracked the increasing use of AI in disinformation before the mid-term elections held in May this year. It found that from February to May, out of 35 unique altered claims, nearly a third 'likely involved deepfake technology to impersonate public figures or distort reality'. 'This is a problem of human behaviour, not AI. It's a disinformation influence operations problem, exacerbated by the unethical usage of AI tools,' Carljoe Javier, executive director of Data and AI Ethics PH, told Al Jazeera. All mainstream political forces in the Philippines have, to some extent, deployed AI technologies to boost their agendas. The latest OpenAI Safety Report revealed that Comm&Sense, a Manila-based tech firm, used AI for a campaign using thousands of pro‑Marcos Jr and anti‑Duterte comments across Facebook and TikTok. Besides generating content, the firm also used AI to analyse political trends and even draft public relations strategies. The report said Comm&Sense manufactured TikTok channels to post identical videos with variant captions while handling shell accounts to post comments and boost engagement. The use of AI to outline plans, not just create content, marks a shift away from the Marcos Jr administration employing troll armies as he did in his 2022 campaign. 'If you have the resources and the bully pulpit of the government, you can afford to keep on swatting the Dutertes and their partisans for whatever statements they have made against the Marcos government,' said Joel Ariate Jr, a researcher tracking political developments at the University of the Philippines Third World Studies Center. 'If you put AI in the hands of an already good public relations or marketing team, the capacity for disinformation is amplified by so much. They can have one message and instantly generate 20 different versions of it,' explained Javier. The Philippines has several pieces of legislation in congress concerning the responsible use of AI. For a healthy policy approach, Javier believes that technical and ethical experts would be crucial. He said he hoped the country's leaders can take important steps, but said he has doubts about their appetite for ethical AI legislation. 'Is there enough push for legislators to advance a policy given that they may be benefitting from the current state of political operations?' he asked.
Yahoo
10-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Rodrigo Duterte 'skin and bones,' says ex-wife, as victims' families demand justice
[Source] Elizabeth Zimmerman, the former wife of ex-Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, says Duterte, 79, has become alarmingly thin as he remains in custody in The Hague. Families of victims of the Philippine drug war say they want Duterte to remain alive to stand trial before the International Criminal Court (ICC). Trial awaits: Duterte was transferred to The Hague after being arrested on an ICC warrant for alleged crimes against humanity related to his 2016 to 2022 anti-drug campaign. Official government figures put the death toll from the drug war at over 6,000 while human rights groups estimate the true number could be much higher. Like an old man: Zimmerman, who visited Duterte last week, said her former husband is 'so thin, skin and bones, unlike in the picture.' When she reportedly asked Duterte why he refuses to eat the food at the facility, he told her he simply doesn't like it since the ICC doesn't serve Filipino food. Zimmerman noted that he no longer takes maintenance medication, has trouble with appetite and mobility and now walks weakly like an old man. Victims' families express concern: Zimmerman's account of his frailty has raised questions about whether he will be able to stand trial. Kristina Conti, a lawyer at the International Criminal Court who represents families of drug war victims, said many relatives are concerned about Duterte's condition. 'We're concerned because we want him alive for the trial,' Conti told local media. Medical officials at the ICC have said they are monitoring Duterte's health and have made medical support available as a precaution. Trending on NextShark: Rodrigo Duterte 'skin and bones,' says ex-wife, as victims' families demand justiceDownload the NextShark App: Want to keep up to date on Asian American News? Download the NextShark App today!
The Guardian
30-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Twenty bodies discovered in Sinaloa as Mexican cartel violence surges
Mexican authorities have found 20 bodies in the state of Sinaloa, a region gripped by a war between factions of the Sinaloa drug cartel that is reaching new heights of violence. The state prosecutor's office said on Monday that four of the victims had been decapitated and their bodies had been found hanging from a bridge on a main road near Culiacán, the state capital. Another 16, one of whom had also been decapitated, were found inside a van parked beneath the bridge. The severed heads were found in a bag at the site. The grisly finding comes at the end of the most violent month so far in a war between factions of the Sinaloa cartel, one of Mexico's most powerful drug-trafficking organisations, amid growing evidence that its main rival, the Jalisco New Generation cartel, has joined the conflict. The war broke out on 9 September 2024, six weeks after the arrest of two of Mexico's most powerful crime bosses in El Paso, Texas. Ismael 'El Mayo' Zambada, who founded the Sinaloa cartel with Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán, was detained along with one of Guzmán's sons after a small plane touched down in the US. El Mayo accused El Chapo's son of betraying him and delivering him to US authorities. Now a faction led by El Mayo's son is waging war against another led by the two sons of El Chapo, who remain free in Mexico. The Mexican government has piled thousands of soldiers into Sinaloa, but has proven unable to curb the violence. The last two months have been the most violent yet. Overall, the war has left nearly 3,000 dead or missing. A message found alongside the bodies under the bridge indicated that the perpetrators belonged to La Mayiza, the faction led by El Mayo's son. In the face of mounting losses, El Chapo's sons, known as Los Chapitos, have reportedly struck a deal with their one-time rival, the Jalisco cartel. The US Drug Enforcement Administration warned about the potential alliance in a report last month. Such an alliance could shift the balance of power in a war that, until two months ago, seemed to be gradually reducing in intensity. It could also lead to a restructuring of the two groups' criminal empires, which extend not just across Mexico but the world. US authorities have previously identified the Chapitos as key drivers in the trafficking of fentanyl, a potent synthetic opioid responsible for hundreds of thousands of overdose deaths in the US in recent years. Under pressure from the Trump administration, Mexican authorities have striven to show greater action against fentanyl trafficking, especially in Sinaloa, with more lab busts, arrests and drug seizures. According to US Customs and Border Protection data, fentanyl seizures at the border with Mexico have fallen by almost 30% this year compared to the same period last year. The Trump administration has also designated the cartels as foreign terrorist organisations, while threatening the possibility of unilateral military action on Mexican soil, and recently accused three mid-sized Mexican banks of laundering drug money, cutting them out of the US financial system.
