The administration of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr said it would cooperate if the ICC asked international police to take Duterte into custody.
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Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was arrested by police at Manila's airport on Tuesday in connection with a case of crimes against humanity filed against him, the country's government said.
Duterte was arrested on the order of the International Criminal Court (ICC) after arriving from Hong Kong.
Police took him into custody on orders of the ICC, which has been investigating the massive killings that happened under the former president's deadly crackdown against illegal drugs, President Ferdinand Marcos' office said in a statement.
“Upon his arrival, the prosecutor general served the ICC notification for an arrest warrant to the former president for the crime of crime against humanity,” the government statement. “He’s now in the custody of authorities."
The surprise arrest sparked a commotion at the airport, where lawyers and aides of Duterte loudly protested that they, along with a doctor and lawyers, were prevented from coming close to him after he was taken into police custody.
“This is a violation of his constitutional right,” Senator Bong Go, a close ally of Duterte, told reporters.
The Manila office of the international police received an official copy of the arrest warrant from the global court, the government said.
It was not immediately clear where the police took Duterte. The government said the 79-year-old former leader was in good health and was examined by government doctors.
The ICC began investigating drug killings under Duterte from 1 November 2011, when he was still mayor of the southern city of Davao, to 16 March 2019, as possible crimes against humanity.
Duterte withdrew the Philippines in 2019 from the Rome Statute in a move human rights activists say was aimed at escaping accountability.
The Duterte administration moved to suspend the global court’s investigation in late 2021 by arguing that Philippine authorities were already looking into the same allegations, arguing the ICC — a court of last resort — didn’t have jurisdiction.
Appeals judges at the ICC ruled in 2023 that the investigation could resume and rejected the Duterte administration’s objections.
Based in The Hague, the ICC can step in when countries are unwilling or unable to prosecute suspects in the most heinous international crimes, including genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.