The two leaders were to meet again Thursday at a joint meeting between Southeast Asian leaders, Obama, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, but Duterte did not attend. Duterte is now on a two-day visit in the country.
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“I did shake hands with President Duterte last night. We asked for help from President Duterte to resolve the case as soon as possible”, President Jokowi said during a meeting with President Duterte at the State Palace in Jakarta onFriday, September 9, 2016.
Duterte had said he’d potentially swear at and challenge his US counterpart if Obama questioned him over his violent war against illegal drugs that has seen more than 2,400 suspects killed since the Philippine leader came to power.
“It’s son of a bitch or son of a gun”.
Speaking at a summit in Laos, Mr Obama had urged Mr Duterte to conduct his crime crackdown “the right way” with respect for the rule of law.
Duterte’s tactics in fighting drug crime have come under fire, as over 2,000 Filipinos have been killed in the effort so far, according to police figures.
Mr Trump also predicted that if elected in November: “I think that I’ll be able to get along with him”.
“You must be respectful”.
If Indonesian forces are chasing pirates and they enter Philippine waters, “they can go ahead and blast them off”, Duterte said.
Duterte delivered the insult in his native Tagalog tongue, just as he had with the statement about Obama, which he now claims he never made.
The President said even if the meeting between him and Obama had been deferred to a later date, they had a brief interaction in a holding room before the gala dinner at the ASEAN summit in Laos.
Mr Duterte, who assumed the presidency in June, has had an uneasy relationship with the U.S., his country’s longtime treaty ally.
He bristled at the suggestion he had been slighted in Asia or that leaders in the region were rejecting his leadership – a criticism levelled by Mr Trump, who said he would have picked up and left had he been treated the way Mr Obama was in Asia. The U.S.is a military ally of the Philippines and has supported it amid tensions with China over the disputed South China Sea.
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In August, President Duterte said that the Philippines might leave the United Nations after it called for an end to a surge in drug-related extrajudicial killings in the country. “I am the president of the Philippines, not the republic of the worldwide community”, he said.
