AKBAYAN Rep. Chel Diokno on Wednesday appealed to the executive department to bring the country back as a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

“Perhaps a good reason for us to return to the International Criminal Court or to the Rome Statute is the aggression of the People’s Republic of China,” Diokno told reporters in an interview in Filipino and English at the House.

The Rome Statute is the treaty that established the ICC.

Diokno, a lawyer, said that “under the ICC, we can file [a case of] crimes of aggression against another country as long as we are members of the ICC and the incidents happened in our territory.”

“So, our appeal to our executive department is [to] let us go back to the ICC,” he said.

President Rodrigo Duterte, angered by its investigation of his bloody war on drugs, pulled the Philippines out of the ICC in 2019.

Diokno is among the 17 lawmakers who on Wednesday filed a resolution urging the executive department, through the Department of Foreign Affairs, to bring a resolution before the United Nations General Assembly calling on China to respect the 2016 arbitral ruling and to stop “its repeated hostile and aggressive acts” against the country in the West Philippine Sea (WPS).

On July 9, Diokno and his fellow Akbayan partymates filed House Bills (HBs) 1625 and 1626.

HB 1625 aimed to mandate the teaching of WPS history and geography in primary and secondary levels of both public and private schools.

“By educating our youth, we help ensure that the next generation will safeguard what is rightfully ours as a nation,” Diokno had said in a statement.

Diokno urges Philippines to rejoin ICC to counter China's aggression

HB 1626 aimed to declare July 12 of every year as National West Philippine Sea Victory Day to commemorate the country’s 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) win.

Diokno urges Philippines to rejoin ICC to counter China's aggression, This news data comes from:http://redcanaco.com

“Declaring July 12 as the West Philippine Sea Victory Day will keep the spirit of our nation’s landmark triumph alive in the hearts and minds of the Filipino people,” read the explanatory note of HB 1626.

On July 12, 2016, The Hague-based PCA ruled that China’s nine-dash line claim in the South China Sea had no legal basis. The ruling stemmed from the case filed by Manila against Beijing in 2013.