The Philippine Supreme Court yesterday rejected Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa’s request for a temporary restraining order to prevent his arrest and transfer to the International Criminal Court (ICC).
On May 11, the ICC unsealed an arrest warrant for Dela Rosa, charging him with crimes against humanity for his role in leading former President Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody “war on drugs” campaign. Dela Rosa then fled to his office in the Senate, before leaving the building before dawn on May 14.
The senator, whose current whereabouts are unknown, also filed three petitions with the Supreme Court, asking it to prevent authorities from arresting him and handing him over to the Hague-based court.
In a 9-5-1 decision issued yesterday, the Supreme Court justices denied Dela Rosa’s petition for a temporary restraining order and an order of status quo ante, the court said in a statement. He clarified that the judges “have only decided requests for interim measures. The main issues raised by the parties in their pleadings and motions have not yet been resolved in the main case.” He added that the Supreme Court would release its full resolution, along with the concurring and dissenting opinions of the 15 justices, on May 25.
Dela Rosa, who served as Philippine National Police chief during the first two years of Duterte’s presidential term, is wanted by the ICC for his leading role in the anti-drug campaign, which raged throughout Duterte’s six-year term (2016-2022). Official estimates of the number of people killed during the campaign range from around 6,000 to 30,000.
If arrested, Dela Rosa would join his former boss, Duterte, who was arrested in March 2025 and extradited to the ICC for his role in the campaign. The 81-year-old is to stand trial after a preliminary commission ruled last month that there were “substantial grounds” to believe he was guilty of crimes against humanity.
The Supreme Court’s decision paves the way for the potential arrest of Dela Rosa, whom the Solicitor General’s Office described last week as a “fugitive from justice.”
Speaking after yesterday’s decision, Claire Castro, spokesperson for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., said the presidential palace would leave it to the Justice Department to interpret the Supreme Court’s decision. Justice Minister Fredderick Vida said last week that the country would “definitely” honor the ICC arrest warrant.
“For now we can say that the arrest warrant is valid against Senator Bato dela Rosa,” Castro said.
Dela Rosa’s lawyers said their client would exhaust all available legal remedies, including filing a motion for reconsideration with the Supreme Court.
“Today’s resolution does not constitute a judgment on the merits,” the lawyers said in a statement. “This is not a final decision on the legality of the application of ICC proceedings in Philippine territory. »
The move is the latest development in the political drama that has monopolized Philippine political coverage over the past two weeks. On May 11, Dela Rosa emerged from six months in hiding to cast a decisive vote in favor of a Senate leadership coup that installed Alan Peter Cayetano, an ally of former President Duterte, as speaker of the chamber. The goal was to prevent or thwart the impending impeachment of Duterte’s daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte, who was impeached by the House of Representatives the same day for a series of transgressions. Duterte’s impeachment trial began in the Senate earlier this week.
However, Dela Rosa was confronted by agents from the National Bureau of Investigation who showed up at the Senate building to execute the ICC arrest warrant. He then hid in his Senate office, where Cayetano and other allies later said they placed him under the chamber’s “protective custody.” The ensuing standoff escalated into violence Wednesday evening when Senate security personnel and government agents trying to apprehend Dela Rosa briefly exchanged gunfire in the Senate building.
Although they may be cloaked in the language of high principles, the ICC arrest warrants and Sara Duterte’s indictment lie downstream of the political feud that has raged between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and the Duterte family for much of the past two years. As The Diplomat details in a new video, the two leaders teamed up to great political effect ahead of the 2022 presidential election, when they were both elected with decisive majorities, before abruptly falling out over a mix of personal and political disagreements.
Both camps are now engaged in a zero-sum vendetta in which Marcos and his allies are using state institutions to cripple Duterte ahead of the 2028 presidential election, for which Sara Duterte has already announced her candidacy. With Duterte well-positioned to avoid impeachment in the Senate, Dela Rosa’s arrest is unlikely to end the current attention-grabbing standoff.