Palace on Sara Duterte's foreign trips: They're bearing fruit

Palace Press Officer Undersecretary Atty. Claire Castro said Wednesday that Vice President Sara Duterte seemed to benefit from her travels abroad after she said that a third country already expressed approval to host her father, former president Rodrigo Duterte.

''Nagbunga naman po yata ang madalas niyang pagbibiyahe. So, kung iyan ay good news po sa kanila at kung ano po ang magiging desisyon ng ICC, tatanggapin naman po iyan ng pamahalaang Marcos Jr.,'' Castro said in a press briefing. 

(Her constant travels have born fruit. So, if this is good news for them and whatever the decision of the International Criminal Court, the government of President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. will accept it.) 

Speaking before a Filipino crowd in Japan, the younger Duterte said a third country has already been secured, as she said she personally negotiated with foreign contacts to find a host country, as she could not trust anyone in the Philippines to help.

She did not specify the country, but said that it is not Japan. Australia, one of the places she traveled to, had earlier said that it has declined to host her father.

The lawyer of the elder Duterte in June asked the International Criminal Court for an interim release and that he be released to an unnamed country, saying that he does not meet any of the conditions to warrant further pre-trial detention as he does not pose an objective flight risk.

The former president, who repeatedly said he will accept full legal responsibility for the consequences of his bloody campaign against illegal drugs, was brought to The Hague in The Netherlands in March to be tried for crimes against humanity. —RF, GMA Integrated News