JERUSALEM - Israeli scientists began their pioneering research to isolate the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana with a 10-pound stash seized by the Tel Aviv police. That effort, in the 1960s, helped propel Israel to the vanguard of research into the plant's medicinal properties and lay the foundations for a medical marijuana industry.

Now the nation's burgeoning pot business, backed by an unlikely coalition of farmers, lawyers, scientists, entrepreneurs and the country's ultra-Orthodox health minister, is going mainstream - and eyeing markets abroad.

[continues 1086 words]

MANILA - Rayzabell Bongol, an 18-year-old mother and methamphetamine user, was afraid to die in President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs in the Philippines. So she turned herself in to the police. They made her sign a pledge that she would never take illegal drugs again, then sent her home.

Once a week now, she is expected to attend a police-sponsored Zumba dance workout, where she gets a health check and a meal. Mr. Duterte "promised change," she said at a recent class as three dozen other recovering addicts bopped and swayed to a blaring Latin beat. "As you can see, I am changing."

[continues 1290 words]

Duterte Used Epithet in Reference to President.

VIENTIANE, LAOS (AP) - President Obama called off a planned meeting Tuesday with new Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, seeking distance from a U.S. ally's leader during a diplomatic tour that has put Obama in close quarters with a cast of contentious world figures.

It's unusual for one president to tell another what to say or not say, and much rarer to call the other a "son of a bitch." Duterte managed to do both just before flying to Laos for a regional summit, warning Obama not to challenge him over extrajudicial killings in the Philippines.

[continues 479 words]

HOWEVER you put it, the Philippine National Police is among the government agencies responsible for the proliferation of illegal drugs in the country-either by direct involvement or sheer ineffectiveness.

Strange enough, the law enforcers who gained notoriety for protecting drug cartels and syndicates in the past are now earning praises for killing drug suspects at will-in the name of a "drug war." Do you really want to vindicate and encourage the police to further abuse its power while the unjust social system prevails?

[continues 218 words]

IT'S EASY: Start with semantics.

Step 1: Establish a consensual value system to shape a receptive audience. A consensual value system is composed of a repertoire of values everyone is willing to accept. It aims to be universal as well as encompassing by differentiating a set of favorable values from those unpalatable to the audience. We desire a drugfree Philippines. Who doesn't?

Values legitimize a political action (be it human rights intervention or extrajudicial killing) by leading their audience to perceive coherence in their binary arrangement.

[continues 774 words]

IT'S A mantra that top government officials keep chanting: Police killings enjoy a presumption of regularity.

This mantra is used in answer to voices of protest when someone is killed by police under suspicious circumstances, such as when an arrested suspect is killed inside a police car for allegedly attempting to grab an officer's gun. This mantra is increasingly being heard as response to criticism against the mounting number of people killed by police in the administration's war on drugs. A total of 929 people have been killed during police operations from July 1 to Aug. 31.

[continues 832 words]

Just like in the movies, but this is real life.

President Duterte admitted he takes inspiration from Western action movies like "Dirty Harry" in waging his bloody war on drugs that has raised concern among the United Nations, the United States and human rights advocates.

Duterte's revelation came just hours before a blast ripped the Roxas night market in his hometown Davao City that killed 14 and injured more than 60 people.

Answering queries from Michael Sullivan of the National Public Radio Washington, Duterte related the movie "Dirty Harry" with the killings of sus-pected drug pushers, particularly those killed by vigilante groups.

[continues 500 words]

LINGAYEN-DAGUPAN Archbishop Socrates Villegas has urged Filipinos to speak up against the spate of killings targeting suspected criminals rather than remain comfortably silent.

In a pastoral message, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) head reminded the faithful that "What you do or not do for the least of your brethren, you do to Christ."

The message was to be read today in all churches under the Archdiocese of Lingayen-Dagupan in lieu of the Sunday homily.

"If you agree with us that killing suspected criminals is a crime and a sin itself, why do you just stay seated there in comfort keeping quiet? Whatever you do or not do for the least of your brethren, you do to Christ," Villegas said.

[continues 397 words]

Aside from nightclubs and bars, authorities are setting their sights on condominium dwellers and call center agents in Metro Manila in the next phase of the war on drugs.

National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) director Chief Supt. Oscar Albayalde said they are investigating reports that drug pushers are using condominium dwellers and call center agents in their illegal transactions.

Albayalde noted that the two groups could evade police detection because many call center agents work at night while condominiums are usually well secured against unwanted visitors. "I've ordered the five district directors to step up the implementation of Oplan Tokhang and Project Double Barrel in condominium units, business process outsourcing ( BPO) offices in Metro Manila," Albayalde said.

[continues 279 words]

JAKARTA, Indonesia - I.B. Agung Partha foresees an apocalypse, as he put it, on the Indonesian resort island of Bali.

The threat is not a plague of locusts, nor one of Bali's dormant volcanos springing to life. It is in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital several hundred miles away, where Parliament is debating legislation that would ban beer, wine and spirits across the thousands of islands that make up this country.

For Bali, whose beaches, lush landscapes and cultural attractions drew four million visitors last year, the effect would be something like the end of the world, said Mr. Partha, the chairman of the Bali Tourism Board.

[continues 1143 words]

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte could face international criminal charges as the death count in his relentless war on drugs tops almost 2000, human rights advocates say.

Comments by the tough-talking former provincial mayor such as "all of you are into drugs, you sons of bitches ... I will kill you" could be used as evidence to prosecute him, they say.

Sam Zarifi, from the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), says it is likely that as the killings continue lawyers will gather evidence to initiate legal proceedings against Mr Duterte, as 9541 victims of the late Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos did in the United States in the 1990s.

[continues 299 words]

As the casualties in the government's war on drugs continue to pile up, the Philippines faces a "human rights calamity," according to Human Rights Watch.

Phelim Kine, Human Rights Watch (HRW) Asia deputy director, said at an ABS-CBN News Channel forum on human rights Tuesday night that the number of suspects killed in the hands of police in the first eight weeks of the Duterte administration is 10 times higher than those who died in the first six months of the year.

[continues 752 words]

President: US Leader Must First See Context

PRESIDENT Duterte yesterday said he was ready to defend his take-no-prisoners war on drugs in a discussion of the human rights situation in the Philippines with US President Barack Obama in Laos next week.

Mr. Duterte said he was willing to meet with Obama on the sidelines of the East Asia Summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) meeting in Vientiane on Sept. 6, but he would demand that he be allowed to first explain the context of his merciless crackdown on the illegal drug trade before engaging the US leader in a discussion of the human rights situation in the Philippines.

[continues 546 words]

The United Nations is only paying lip service to the fight against illegal drugs and is even prejudging the involvement of law enforcers in summary executions of suspected drug offenders, Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto Yasay Jr. said on Monday.

"The UN is just making mere lip service, stymied by the most vocal who seem to protect the illegal drugs trade," Yasay said.

"This is the kind of frustration we must express. We must also understand the UN is not the solution but we must all be active participants," he told journalists at the Japan-ASEAN Media Forum at the Edsa Shangri-La Hotel in Mandaluyong City.

[continues 203 words]

DID "The Punisher" just own up to the killing of druggies?

President Duterte has admitted the government's lack of funds for the rehabilitation of drug dependents had led to the deaths of suspected drug lords.

Since he assumed the presidency on June 30, almost 2,000 alleged drug pushers and users had died in police operations and vigilante killings.

Speaking before members of the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption (VACC) in Malacanang Monday night, the President said his administration did not have the money to finance recovery programs for some 700,000 drug users who had turned themselves in to police.

[continues 85 words]

CEBU CITY - The Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) has intensified its campaign against illegal drugs with the launching of Oplan Pokemon, the police version of the popular mobile phone game.

Just like the popular mobile phone app game, where players go to places to catch Pokemon monsters, Oplan Pokemon calls for the local police to go to different areas to look for those involved in the illegal drugs trade.

The CCPO marked its first operation under Oplan Pokemon with a convoy of patrol cars and funeral hearse.

[continues 156 words]

ILOILO CITY - Church and religious groups have decried the surge in killings of suspected drug pushers and have called on the faithful to "defend the dignity of life."

Fr. Marco Sulayao, chair of Promotion of Church People's Response (PCPR) on Panay Island, said while religious people support the eradication of illegal drugs and rehabilitation of drug dependents, these should be done without the "wanton" killings of suspected drug pushers.

He said there has been no significant outcry because of the people's desire to get rid of illegal drugs, which have victimized many, especially the youth.

[continues 353 words]

Under fire for allegedly condoning extralegal killings, Malacanang yesterday told the international media to visit the Philippines so they can see for themselves the extent of the drug menace in the country.

Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar said visiting the country would enable foreign journalists to understand the context of President Duterte's tough pronouncements on narcotics and crime.

"The international media, as I have repeated time and again, should come to the Philippines and experience the life of the barangay (village) people who have so much drug problems," Andanar told reporters on the sidelines of the Japan-ASEAN Media Forum at the EDSA Shangri-La Hotel in Mandaluyong City.

[continues 571 words]

(AP) - PRESIDENT Duterte said on Monday that the bloody antidrug campaign, that has left nearly 1,800 people dead, did not amount to genocide, but he nevertheless assured the policemen he was ready to go to jail to defend them from lawsuits.

Mr. Duterte drew a line between the widespread killings sparked by his antidrug war and the brutality under Syrian President Bashar Assad and the atrocities committed by the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group.

"Genocide? Who did I kill? I did not kill any child. I did not drop barrel (bombs) just like Assad," the President said in a speech to mark National Heroes' Day before war veterans, ambassadors and top officials. "I'm fighting ... criminals."

[continues 230 words]

THERE seems to be no doubt on the unwavering commitment of the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte to fulfill his campaign promise of going all-out against the drug menace, come hell or high water.

The campaign rhetoric had hinted how bloody the war against illegal drugs and criminality might be-like when then presidential candidate Duterte impressed upon the electorate that 100,000 criminals could die and their bodies dumped into Manila Bay to fatten the fish there-but the actual number of fatalities can still be very alarming, particularly to human rights advocates.

[continues 706 words]