COTABATO CITY, 15 September — The country’s biggest Moro separatist group yesterday accused the national police of “recycling” a “cheap propaganda” linking its fighters to foreign extremist groups.

“There is actually nothing new in this report,” said MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu, reacting to a Philippine National Police (PNP) intelligence report that at least 30 foreign extremists trained in four of their camps in Central Mindanao.

Director Roberto Delfin, who heads the PNP’s intelligence division, said some of those extremists have been linked by authorities in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and the United States to the Al-Qaeda network and the Jema’ah Islamiya.

One of the suspects named Fathur Al-Ghozi, an Indonesian, is serving time in a Philippine jail for illegal possession of explosives.

In a press statement, Kabalu said the report was not only irresponsible but unproductive, considering that the MILF is in the midst of peace negotiations with the government.

“The MILF does not need linkages with known terrorist organizations because it is fighting for a legitimate cause. That being the case, the MILF will only employ legal means to achieve its objective, particularly, those provided for under the International Geneva Convention,” he explained.

Kabalu said some elements in government seem to be trying to link the MILF to the World Trade Center in New York but such “dirty trick” will not work.

“No less than the United States of America has classified the MILF as not a terrorist organization,” he said.

Not a kidnapping case

Another “smear campaign” against the MILF, he said, was the military’s attempt to link separatists to supposed kidnapping case yesterday in Barangay Kalumamis of Talayan town in Maguindanao province.

According to the army’s 6th Infantry Division, gunmen led by a certai certain Commander Pilma of the MILF abducted a 70-year-old man named Binatak.

Kabalu said the fresh charge was stupid because the abduction involves a simple case of land dispute between Binatak and his own nephews’ sons of the late Liduwan, a brother-in-law of Binatak himself, having been married to the sister of Liduwan.

A piece of land owned by Liduwan was mortgaged to Binatak, who now claims to have been bought it from the late Liduwan, even though he had no evidence to support his claim.

The conflict was then brought to the Shariah court in the MILF’s Camp Abubakar, because the parties involved decided to settle the conflict amicably by directing Binatak to compensate the heirs of Liduwan. Binatak, however, refused to comply as he continued to disregard the court settlement, despite the intervention of the local leaders in the community urging him to honor and comply with the arrangement.

It was at this juncture that the heirs of Liduwan decided to take him into custody, Kabalu said. To prevent violence, MILF elements in the area intervened and both parties agreed to settle the dispute in a peaceful manner, he added.

Sabah

In another development, Kabalu denied allegations by some sectors that the MILF was siding with Malaysia on the issue of whether the Philippines should revive its claim over Sabah.

Allies of jailed Moro leader Nur Misuari and some legislators in Manila have called for a reopening of the claim in response to Malaysia’s expulsion of thousands of Filipino illegal migrants in Sabah.

But the MILF said pursuing the Sabah issue at this point would only “aggravate the already complicated situation in Mindanao, specifically, and the Asian region as a whole.”

Tensions rose last month when Malaysia started kicking out Filipino migrants, most of whom are Muslims who fled Mindanao during the war between the Philippine government and Moro separatists in the 70s.

In urging the government not to pursue the claim, the MILF this week said it prefers that the people of Sabah be asked to decide their fate in a referendum to be supervised by the United Nations.

It said it may not be practical to get the Sabahans to join the Philippines since they are already “progressive, contended and secure in the Federation of Malaysia.”

“Rather than aspire for the recovery of Sabah, the government should instead hasten the resolution of the Mindanao conflict and allow the Bangsamoro people to settle the problem with their fellow Muslim brothers in Malaysia,” said Kabalu said.