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The Department of Trade and Industry said the Philippines remains compliant with international conventions as a requirement under the European Union’s Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus program
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The European Parliament last week reiterated its call to temporarily withdraw the Philippines from the GSP+ program over the country’s alleged continued human rights violations
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The Parliament called on the European Commission to set clear and time-bound benchmarks for the Philippines to comply with its human rights obligations under the GSP+ scheme
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The legislature urged the Commission to immediately begin procedures leading to the withdrawal procedure unless there is substantial improvement and Philippine authorities cooperate
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DTI said a dialogue mechanism is in place where concerns raised by the EU legislative body can be further clarified
The Philippines remains compliant with international conventions as a requirement under the European Union’s (EU) Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) program, according to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).
The statement is in response to the resolution adopted by the European Parliament on February 17 that reiterated a call to temporarily withdraw the Philippines from the GSP+ program over alleged continued human rights violations in the country.
GSP+ is an EU program that allows beneficiary countries’ products duty-free access to the European market. The Philippines received beneficiary country status under the EU GSP+ in December 2014. Under this, the Philippines may export 6,274 eligible products duty-free to the EU market. Before December 2014, the country was covered by the regular EU GSP, which provides zero duty to only 2,442 products and reduced tariffs to 3,767 products.
About 26% of total Philippine exports to the EU valued at EUR 1.6 billion (P27.2 billion at today’s exchange rate) enjoyed preferential treatment under the scheme in 2020.
DTI said there is a dialogue mechanism in place where issues and concerns raised by the EU legislative body can be further clarified.
Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said the Philippines has been cooperative with the EU and has repeatedly addressed its concerns in existing dialogue mechanisms. He stressed the Philippines remains compliant with the 27 international core conventions on human rights (HR), labor, environment and good governance to enjoy GSP+ treatment.
“The allegations are not new, and the Philippine government has always responded and been giving submissions to facilitate the EU GSP+ monitoring to show the country’s compliance with the 27 international core conventions on HR, labor, environment and good governance,” Lopez said.
Trade assistant secretary Allan Gepty reiterated that, as in the past, the Philippine government is more than willing to cooperate and work with the EU to clarify and shed light to these issues and concerns. “This is not the first time that the European Parliament approved such kind of resolutions. The European Parliament has also passed similar resolutions in 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2020. The Philippine government remains ready to cooperate and work with the EU to clarify these issues and concerns,” he said.
In the resolution, the EU Parliament called on the European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union, “to set clear, public, time-bound benchmarks for the Philippines to comply with its human rights obligations” under the GSP+.
The Parliament said it “strongly reiterates its call on the Commission to immediately initiate the procedure which could lead to the temporary withdrawal of GSP+ preferences if there is no substantial improvement and willingness to cooperate on the part of the Philippine authorities”.
The EU Parliament made a similar call in a resolution it passed in September 2020, urging the Commission to immediately start the procedure for the temporary withdrawal of the GSP+ privileges of the Philippines “given the seriousness of the human rights violations in the country.”
READ: EU wants PH tariff perks withdrawn over human rights abuses
Also in 2018, the EU Parliament repeated its call to Philippine authorities to stop alleged extrajudicial killings carried out through President Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs, saying these actions were against the country’s international obligations under programs such as the EU’s GSP+ and the PH-EU Partnership on Cooperation and Agreement.
READ: PH drug war could lead to temporary withdrawal of EU GSP+
GSP+ is based on the concept of sustainable development, and countries that wish to join the program must commit to effectively implement the core international conventions on human and labor rights, environmental protection, and good governance. If not, they may be removed from the special program.
The EU legislative body also said it “strongly condemns the thousands of extrajudicial killings and other serious human rights violations related to President Rodrigo Duterte’s ‘war on drugs’ in the Philippines.”
The resolution cited a June 30, 2020 report by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights that found the killings related to the government’s anti-drug campaign were “widespread and systematic.”
According to civil society organizations, between 12,000 and 30,000 people have been killed since the drug raids began when Duterte assumed the presidency on July 1, 2016. The authorities attribute 6,200 deaths to police action during these raids.
In addition, the EU Parliament condemned all intimidation and violence against those seeking to expose allegations of such abuses in the country, such as human rights activists, journalists and critics.
Among other issues, the Parliament denounced government officials’ “red-tagging” activists, journalists and critics, exposing them to potential harm and called for the abolition of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict, which is in charge of carrying out red-tagging activities.
It urged the government to amend the Anti-Terrorism Act and its implementing rules and regulations to bring them into line with international standards on counter-terrorism.
While urging the Filipino authorities to thoroughly investigate any extrajudicial killings and similar violations, the EU Parliament also called on them to respect the right to freedom of expression, and to ensure that journalists can do their work without fear.
It urged an end to the persecution of all independent journalists in the country, including Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Ressa, and reiterated its call to end the political harassment of Senator Leila de Lima.
The EU Parliament also voiced fears that during the upcoming election and campaign period, political rights online and offline will be further violated and restricted, and called on all candidates to stop using disinformation campaigns and troll armies, and to commit to fair and fact-based campaigning.
In response to the resolution, the Department of Foreign Affairs said in a statement it condemns the “misguided attempt of the European Parliament to interfere in the Philippine electoral process through its Resolution raising already discredited allegations of human rights violations in the thin hope of heavily influencing the outcome in favor of its choice.”
