Posts misuse outdated report to claim no ICC warrant for Philippine senator's arrest
- Published on May 29, 2026 at 09:29
- 3 min read
- By Ara EUGENIO, AFP Philippines
The International Criminal Court (ICC) in mid-May 2026 made public its arrest warrant for Philippine Senator Ronald Dela Rosa over his role in the nation's brutal drug war, contradicting posts from his supporters that no such order was issued. The posts misrepresent an outdated news report from broadcaster GMA News that aired before the tribunal confirmed the warrant, which it had kept under seal since November 2025.
"As it turns out, the ICC didn't even issue an arrest warrant against Senator Bato," says a May 12 Facebook post, using the popular nickname for the fugitive senator.
The Tagalog-language post features a video report from Philippine broadcaster GMA News, which quotes the ICC as saying that no "public arrest warrants" have been issued regarding the Philippines.
The clip also circulated in similar Facebook posts as government agents attempted to serve Dela Rosa with an ICC warrant tied to his role as the chief enforcer of ex-president Rodrigo Duterte's deadly anti-drugs campaign that rights groups say killed thousands (archived link).
Duterte faces three counts of crimes against humanity, with prosecutors alleging his involvement in at least 76 murders between 2013 and 2018.
Government agents attempted to serve the warrant at the Philippine Senate complex on May 11, where Dela Rosa emerged -- having not been seen publicly since November -- to take part in an unexpected vote that helped Duterte loyalists capture control of the Senate (archived link).
A video released by the Senate captured chaotic scenes of Dela Rosa being chased up stairs by agents attempting to arrest him -- an effort that was later paused as the new Senate leadership gave him sanctuary.
A comment on one of the circulating posts reads: "Just as I thought, that warrant is fake."
"If they catch him, it's just going to be another kidnapping situation," says another, echoing language used by Duterte's supporters to describe the former president's arrest and subsequent transfer to an ICC detention centre in The Hague over a year earlier.
The news report cited by the posts, however, is outdated.
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the falsely shared video led to the GMA News report, which was uploaded to its YouTube channel on May 9 (archived link).
After Dela Rosa emerged from hiding at the Senate on May 11, former senator Antonio Trillanes -- an outspoken critic of the drug war -- showed journalists a physical copy of the ICC warrant (archived link).
The ICC subsequently said it was unsealing the arrest warrant for Dela Rosa, which was confidentially issued on November 6, 2025 (archived here and here).
According to an article on the Open Society Justice Initiative website, persons subject to an ICC arrest warrant under seal do not know that they are wanted by the court and are therefore less likely to make efforts to evade apprehension (archived link).
"This confidential process therefore enables greater manoeuvrability in tracking suspects and planning an arrest strategy," it says.
Dela Rosa petitioned the Supreme Court to block attempts to arrest him while he was holed up in the Senate, but the court on May 20 issued an interim ruling refusing his bid for a temporary restraining order (archived link).
Dela Rosa fled the Senate on May 14, a day after chaotic scenes that saw Senate security personnel and government agents fire warning shots, and remains on the run (archived here and here).
AFP has debunked other misinformation about the attempted arrest of Dela Rosa.
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