Philippines in crosshairs for Western trade sanctions 

On March 9 in Davao City, Duterte warned officials from the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao to work with the police to fight worsening terrorism so that he would not have to resort to “extraordinary measures” to bring law and order there.
Last week, EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom broke her silence on the Philippines, joining international organisations that have denounced the bloody drug war and reinstatement of the death penalty. “We are concerned about some of the issues here in the Philippines.
“That means the death penalty, the extrajudicial killings, the lowering of the age of criminal responsibility to nine years old,” she told reporters on March 10. “We have conveyed [these concerns] to our partners here in the Philippines,” she added.
The EU’s top trade official declined to say how recent developments would affect the bloc’s economic ties with Manila, but noted these are all “under discussion”.
She made mention of the Generalised System of Preferences-Plus (GSP-Plus) of zero tariffs on over 6,000 Philippine products that are exported to the EU. “We have now an agreement between us, called GSP-Plus, which opens up good trade possibilities, but is also subject to certain international conventions. So the European Parliament and member-states in the EU have some concerns about this development,” she said.
She was referring to the passage of the death penalty bill earlier this month in the House of Representatives.
The Philippines abolished the death penalty in 2006. The country carried its stance against capital punishment to the United Nations in 2007, when Manila ratified the Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The protocol binds parties to their commitment against restoring the death penalty. And since there is no opt-out mechanism in the agreement, re-imposing the death penalty (as backed by the Duterte administration) will mean breaching the covenant, legal experts warn.
The economic benefit is conditional on the Duterte administration’s compliance with key international covenants, including the 2007 protocol. This puts the Philippine government in a bind.
With international diplomatic pressure mounting for Manila to respect UN protocols in a brutal war on drugs that has so far claimed about 7,000 lives, French Ambassador Thierry Mathou said he “hoped” the death penalty would not be restored. He told the Inquirer he had spoken to some legislators about the legislation. “France has been advocating the abolition of the death penalty everywhere in the world – even in the US,” he said on the sidelines of the ceremonies marking the 70th year of Philippine-France diplomatic relations.