Nobel winner warns US of descent 'into hell' like Duterte-era Philippines

The US is "descending into hell" at the hands of the same forces that consumed the Philippines with the election of Rodrigo Duterte nine years ago, the American-Filipino Nobel laureate Maria Ressa has said.

- Ashifa Kassam

Duterte, a former Philippines president who oversaw a "war on drugs" that rights groups estimate cost 30,000 lives, was arrested last week.

Ressa said the trial of Duterte at the international criminal court in The Hague, where he stands accused of crimes against humanity, was a welcome sign that thousands of victims and their families may finally see justice. "There's a sense that impunity ends and that the idea of an international, rules-based order can perhaps still exist."

However, the journalist and author said she found it impossible to untangle the news from the bigger picture. In 2016 Duterte had become the "first president elected with social media", she said, seizing on the ubiquity of Facebook in the Philippines to mobilise online mobs and spread disinformation. Now, she said, the same tactics were being used to undermine democracy around the world, particularly in the US.

"I joke all the time that the Philippines went from hell to purgatory... My only worry is the west and America is at the stage we were at in 2016, when you're descending to hell," she said. "To watch this deja vu... it's like a bad punishment for me."