UNITED NATIONS: Philippines President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo said yesterday her government was committed to a peace process in the south and would restart talks with “responsible” rebel leaders when the area is secure.
“There is no alternative to peace. I stand before you today to declare loud and clear that we are committed to the process of peace in Mindanao,” Arroyo said in a speech to the UN General Assembly.
The Philippines’ largest Muslim rebel group, Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), appealed recently to the international community to help bring the government and guerrillas back to the negotiating table and end fighting in the south.
Arroyo decided to scrap the talks this month after rogue rebel members attacked communities on Mindanao in August, killing civilians and burning property, officials have said.
“We will restart the dialogue when the area is secure, our people are safe and responsible elements in the MILF regain control,” Arroyo said.
Much progress was made “until violent elements with the MILF decided to take the law into their own hands.” The peace talks would be refocused from centering on talking to the rebels to what Arroyo called “authentic dialogues with the communities.”
“The context of our engagement with all armed groups shall subscribe to the UN-recognized principle of demobilization, disarmament and reintegration,” she noted. “We maintain high hopes in interfaith dialogue as a means to building bridges rather than barriers between communities of different cultures and ethnicity.” Manila would host the first special ministerial meeting on interfaith dialogue for cooperation and development next year.
The recent rise in violence has threatened more than a decade of peace talks brokered by Malaysia since March 2001.
Nearly 40 years of conflict in the impoverished south of the mainly Roman Catholic state has killed more than 120,000 people and stunted growth in a region believed to be sitting on rich deposits of metals, oil and natural gas.
