14 hours ago
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Daphne Galvez - The Philippine Star
March 26, 2025 | 12:00am
A handout photo from Timor-Leste's police organization show the arrest of expelled lawmaker Arnolfo Teves Jr. in Dili, East Timor in June 2024.
Polícia Científica e de Investigação Criminal
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine government could oppose Timor-Leste’s bid to join the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for refusing to extradite former Negros Oriental congressman Arnolfo Teves Jr., according to Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla.
“It’s not going to be pleasant for Timor-Leste because they’re applying to be in the ASEAN. We are one of the founding fathers of the ASEAN,” Remulla told reporters yesterday.
The government is set to appeal the Timor-Leste Court of Appeal’s decision to block Teves’ extradition on grounds that he could face torture or inhumane treatment if returned to the country.
Teves’ legal counsel Ferdinand Topacio said the government cannot ask Timor-Leste to deport Teves as it would be tantamount to asking the country to “obliquely transgress its Constitution.”
“He cannot ask a sovereign country to do indirectly what it cannot do directly. That is against an established principle of law,” Topacio said.
“Secretary Remulla should know better than that, being a lawyer and a member of the Cabinet primarily tasked with enforcing the law. If that is the mentality of the head of the justice department, then this country is royally screwed,” he added.
Remulla said Teves’ case is “a simple matter of an undocumented Filipino who’s accused of a crime to be returned to the country.”
“For them (Timor-Leste) to complicate it is a big stretch. His passport has been canceled. All they have to do is deport him. For them to go into certain matters that are intrinsically local to us, it’s a big stretch,” he said.
Teves is facing multiple charges of murder and attempted murder for allegedly being the mastermind behind the assassination of former Negros Oriental governor Roel Degamo in March 2023.
Teves and others have also been charged with the deaths of three people in Negros Oriental in 2019.
Designated as a “terrorist,” Teves has been out of the country since 2023.
In junking the Philippines’ extradition request, the Timor-Leste court cited the recantations of several witnesses who claimed they were forced to sign affidavits “pre-prepared by police and military personnel” to implicate Teves.
