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DPA
MANILA
REPORTS that up to 7,000 victims have died amid the government's campaign against illegal drugs since Philipppines President Rodrigo Duterte assumed office are"irritating" because of their inaccuracy, charged the country's police chief on Monday.
Director General Ronald Dela Rosa said the national police have, so far, only recorded 6,011 homicide cases from July 1 to March 24. Of those, only 23.2 per cent were found to be drug-related. The majority of the cases, 63 per cent, were unresolved and no motive for the killing has not been established, he added.
Various international news organisations and human rights groups have been reporting that the number of victims killed in the Philippines' drug war reached or even surpassed 7,000, and that many were killed without due process. But Dela Rosa said the figure was"much sensationalised and misinterpreted."
"We just want to disprove the persistent and irritating claim by some sectors that there are 7,000 extra-judicial killings in the government's drug war," Dela Rosa told a press conference where he released the police statistics.
"I would like to emphasise that the homicides that we are currently investigating are not necessarily the direct result of our ongoing anti-drug campaign," he said.
Earlier statistics released by police showed that, from July 1 to the last week of January, a total of 2,512 suspected drug pushers and users were killed in police operations.
Another 2,928 victims of deaths under investigation were recorded from July 1 to December 15. Police have not been releasing new data of deaths under investigation.
