NEGERI SIMBILIN, Malaysia, 26 July — The government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) will sign another set of documents next month in time for President Arroyo’s first state visit to Malaysia on Aug. 7, an MILF leader said yesterday.
MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu said this was relayed to him by Murad Ebrahim, the head of the MILF negotiators meeting with the government panel at Port Dickson in Malaysia.
Kabalu also said that the negotiations would be suspended “perhaps today or tomorrow” as the government negotiators would be leaving for Manila for consultations.
This would extend the second round of talks, originally scheduled from July 24 to 27, into August, by which time another agreement would have been signed, Kabalu said.
It looks like the government panel had sensed the MILF’s hard-line stance not only on the issue of implementation of all past agreements, but other concerns also provided for under the Tripoli Agreement II, another MILF official told Arab News.
Even as negotiations are going on to end the MILF’s 23-year insurgency, the MILF has been setting up three new military camps in Central Mindanao, a high-level military source said.
The source said military field commanders have verified the establishment of MILF facilities in Munai and Nunugan towns in Lanao del Norte and in the municipality of Riapayungan, Lanao del Sur.
The Nunugan camp is reportedly a training camp manned by at least 100 rebels.
The source said the three camps have been put under the command of the MILF’s 302nd Brigade under Abdul Rakam Macaapar.
Macaapar, alias Commander Bravo, has been tagged by the military as responsible for the bombing of two passenger buses aboard a ferry boat in Ozamiz City in 1999 which killed 34 people, and for the occupation of Kauswagan town last year and the massacre of Christians in Bumbaran in the Lanao provinces last year.
The camps are near two former MILF camps — John Mack and Bushra.
The source said the armed forces have yet to receive orders from the political leadership on how it should deal with this development.
The official believes the MILF is positioning its forces so it can later claim territories in the ongoing peace negotiations.
