Philippines President To Obama: ‘Go To Hell’

Filipino president Rodrigo Duterte said President Barack Obama can “go to hell” for criticizing his deadly crackdown on drug users in the island nation.

“Instead of helping us, the first to criticize is this State Department, so you can go to hell, Mr. Obama, you can go to hell,” Duterte said, according to the Associated Press.

He the said the European Union, which has also been critical of Duterte, “Better choose purgatory, hell is filled up.”

In a later speech, Duterte said his country might “break up with America.”

“Eventually I might, in my time, I will break up with America,” Duterte said. “I would rather go to Russia and to China.”

Duterte’s tough talk about the United States comes after he has made international headlines foe vowing to execute drug dealers and even drug users in his country. More than 3,000 people have already been killed, many of them killed by police in the country’s war on drugs, according to Al Jazeera.

Duterte has said he wants the U.S. to help him carry out his drug war, but the U.S. has refused. And without American help, the Filipino leader said he might have to reconsider the geopolitical relationship his country has with the U.S.

But Duterte’s talk isn’t just empty threats. The United States has strategic military bases in the Philippines and relies on good relations with the country’s leaders to continue that relationship.

“Better think twice now because I would be asking you to leave the Philippines altogether,” Duterte warned the U.S. government, according to the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

Duterte said he has already had talks with Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in September as he seeks to strengthen ties with Russia, as well as China.

“Tomorrow I will be friends with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and [Chinese President] Xi Jinping,” Duterte said. 

Sources: Associated Press, Al Jazeera, Philippine Daily Inquirer/ Photo Credit: Karl Alonzo/PPD