THREE women judges of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Pre-Trial Chamber 1 penned the arrest warrant of former president Rodrigo Duterte for charges of crimes against humanity on Tuesday, March 11.
Judges Iulia Antoanella Motoc, Reine Adélaïde Sophie Alapini-Gansou, and María del Socorro Flores Liera signed the warrant, which was served on the ex-president with the assistance of the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol).
Duterte is facing charges before the ICC due to his bloody war on drugs campaign, which claimed the lives of more than 6,000 individuals, based on police reports. However, the Commission on Human Rights recorded a higher number of about 27,000 in 2018.
The warrant came after the ICC’s investigation into Duterte’s extrajudicial killings. The probe began in February 2018.
Despite Duterte’s move to detach the country from the ICC in 2018 to stave off the probe, the Philippine withdrawal went into effect a year after, based on the Rome Statute that established the ICC in 2002.
On Tuesday, Duterte was taken into custody upon his arrival from Hong Kong following an arrest warrant issued by the ICC via Interpol, the international police agency.
Iulia Antoanella Motoc
The first presider for Duterte’s case is 57-year-old Iulia Antoanella Motoc, elected as a member of Pre-Trial Chambers I and III of ICC last December 2024.
Motoc, a Romanian by nationality, held positions in various courts, such as the Constitutional Court of Romania, from 2010 to 2013, handling several cases of sexual violence, genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.
Before this, she was a judge at the European Court of Human Rights from 2013 to 2023.
Motoc is a law professor at the University of Bucharest, and is a former United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2001 and chair of the UN Subcommission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights from 2000 to 2001.
She presides over 14 out of 18 “situations” and cases lodged in the ICC pre-trial chambers where she is a member.
In 2024, Motoc presided over two situations involving victims of hostilities in Palestine.
Motoc is the youngest of the three female judges who issued the warrant.
Reine Adélaïde Sophie Alapini-Gansou
Assigned as the second vice president of the ICC, Alapini-Gansou is the most senior judge in the chamber, elected in March 2018 with a nine-year term.
A native of Benin, a country in western Africa, Alapini-Gansou chaired the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights from 2009 to 2012.
She also served as a Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders in Africa for nine years, from 2005 to 2009 and 2012 to 2017.
In 2011, Alapini-Gansou was appointed judge at the Permanent Court of Arbitration, which hears cases between states.
She has handled 37 situations, sitting in various chambers such as appeals, pre-trial, and trial. She handles 19 situations and cases, presiding in one.
In November of 2024, a Russian court ordered her arrest after a decision from her pre-trial chamber to issue an arrest warrant for Russian president Vladimir Putin over his alleged war crimes.
At 68 years old, Alapini-Gansou is the oldest judge in the chamber that will hear former president Duterte’s case.
María del Socorro Flores Liera
The first ICC judge of Mexican descent, Flores Liera was elected in March 2021 for a nine-year term.
Before joining the ICC, the 59-year-old lawyer served as the vice president of the UN Human Rights Council in 2020.
Flores Liera is a member of the Mexican delegation that partook in the negotiations leading to the creation of the Rome Statute in 1998.
A graduate of the Universidad Iberoamericana, the oldest Jesuit school in Mexico, her expertise in international law landed her the role of UN representative for Mexico.
She previously handled 23 situations and cases as a member of the Court’s pre-trial and trial chambers and presided over four cases.
