US Intel linking her to drugs? De Lima says it’s out of this world
Senator Leila de Lima (INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / MARIANNE BERMUDEZ)
MANILA — What foreign intelligence?
Detained Sen. Leila de Lima had this response Thursday to reports of a supposed United States intelligence information that the state might use to prove drug allegations against her, saying it was just another lie.
“It might as well be an intel from the planet Mars or Jupiter,” De Lima said in a handwritten note from her cell in Camp Crame released publicly Thursday afternoon.
“I highly doubt whether there’s such a US intel. If there is, it must be a spurious one, or based on a highly dubious or polluted source or sources,” she said.
De Lima called for the release of the supposed intelligence information, which Sen. JV Ejercito bared to reporters Wednesday, citing how President Duterte mentioned it during his dinner with the Senate majority bloc Tuesday night.
“I demand that the details of such so-called US intel, if there is one, be made public so I can confront them,” she said.
Ejercito said Mr. Duterte spoke of having US intelligence data that backed up the state’s drug sale and trade cases against De Lima, now pending before the Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court. De Lima was arrested two weeks ago based on the cases.
Citing the President’s statements, Ejercito said such foreign intelligence would show that the cases against De LIma were “not trumped-up charges, that there’s basis.”
The intelligence information was supposedly from the US Drug Enforcement Agency, which relayed it to the Philippines’ National Intelligence Coordinating Agency. Another lawmaker said the US report was forwarded to Philippine authorities by the US State Department.
But De Lima dismissed the supposed information against her, saying: “Another big lie! Incessant black propaganda.”
She reiterated that she was not involved in the drug trade.
“May I assure my gullible colleagues in the Senate and our people that I have absolutely nothing to do with the illegal drug trade,” she said. SFM/rga
