MANILA - Australia is concerned with the killings related to the Duterte administration's war on drugs, but its envoy to Manila said they shall raise it to the authorities in "a respectful way."

Australian ambassador Amanda Gorely, who earlier had a run-in with President Rodrigo Duterte during the campaign, asserted that though they have concerns on the killings left at the drug war's trail, they will discuss this with the administration in a "respectful" manner.

"Nobody likes to see people being killed without trial or without having the opportunity to present their case, so we do have concerns about human rights," she said in an interview with ANC's Headstart.

"But we will discuss those in a respectful way with the Duterte administration, just as we would expect the Duterte administration to raise any concerns about Australia’s human rights record with us in a respectful way, and that’s what we’re doing," she added.

In his six months in office, President Rodrigo Duterte had grabbed international headlines when he cursed at former US President Barack Obama and former United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon after they criticized his drug war.

Gorely said the drug menace is not only a problem in the Philippines, but in Australia as well, adding that there are "very similar, percentage-wise, number of drug users in Australia as is right here in the Philippines."

In Australia, she said, a mix of law enforcement, rehabilitation, and international cooperation is being employed to quell the drug problem. She underscored that they have "worked closely with the Philippines a number of times to bust drug rings" and will continue to do that.

"We came to work with President Duterte and his administration on tackling crime, but also on the rehabilitation aspects of the drug problem," she said.