Retired Philippine policeman says worked for 'death squad' under Duterte

According to REUTERS UK - Police completed killings in the Philippine city of Davao under the guideline of then mayor Rodrigo Duterte, the present president, as indicated by a previous policeman who said he was part of a "Davao death squad" entrusted with wiping out criminals.

Arturo Lascanas, a retired Davao policeman, said on Monday he had beforehand killed a radio host disparaging of Duterte at the command of a driver and close associate of the mayor, and that Duterte had paid cash to police for completing deaths.

Duterte has over and over denied contribution in vigilantism either as president, or amid his aggregate of 22 years as Davao mayor until late 2015. He and the police have prevented the presence from claiming a Davao death squad, depicting it as fiction

"Of the considerable number of killings we did in Davao City, it is possible that we cover them or toss them into the ocean, it is paid (for) by Mayor Rody Duterte," told a news gathering at the Senate in Manila. Lascanas

"More often than not 20,000 (pesos) infrequently 50,000 and relying upon the status of the objective, now and then 100,000."

Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar, in a meeting with CNN Philippines, depicted Lascanas' cases as part of "an extended political show" and endeavored "character assassination" of Duterte arranged by his main chief critics.

Lascanas' remarks varied from those he made at a Senate hearing in October into claimed unlawful medication killings. Lascanas around then prevented the presence from claiming a Davao death squad.

His record on Monday was similar to that of a self-admitted hit man Edgar Matobato, who affirmed before a Senate hearing in September to expressly watching Duterte shoot a man dead and give orders for police to kill speculated criminals.

Human rights groups have archived around 1,400 suspicious killings in Davao since the mid 1990s and critics say the bloody war on drugs Duterte has unleashed since taking office seven months prior bears the signs of similar methods.

More than 7,700 individuals have been murdered in the across the nation against drugs crackdown, somewhere in the range of 2,500 in what police say are shootouts amid attacks and sting operations.

A significant number of the rest are under scrutiny and credited by the experts to vigilante killings, drugs posses covering their tracks and irrelevant homicides. Activists, in any case, say many have been extrajudicial killings.

SOURCE: REUTERS UK