KUALA LUMPUR/MANILA, 25 February 2003 — Malaysia and Libya have agreed to mediate in a peace process between the Philippine government and Muslim separatist rebels, an official said yesterday.
The pledge came during separate meetings President Gloria Arroyo held with Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and Libyan Foreign Minister Abelrahman Mohamed Shalghem on the sidelines of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit in the Malaysian capital.
“Their most important agenda was to talk about how Kuala Lumpur can help in the peace process with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF),” Arroyo’s spokesman Ignacio Bunye told AFP.
“Prime Minister Mahathir promised to mediate between our government and the MILF to speed up the peace process,” he said, but declined to say whether Malaysia had offered to host negotiations.
In Arroyo’s meeting with Shalghem, “again they talked about the peace process with the MILF, where Libya also promised to work with our government,” Bunye said.
A special envoy from Manila was in Kuala Lumpur this week to lay ground for possible Malaysian mediation to end the two decades of armed struggle waged by the MILF for a separate homeland in the island of Mindanao.
Fighting between government troops and the MILF earlier this month left about 200 people dead and led to the capture of a key rebel camp in the south.
Bunye said Arroyo remained committed to a swift conclusion of a peace agreement.
“The president as much as possible would like to accelerate the conclusion of the peace agreement,” Bunye said, noting the six-month deadline earlier set by Arroyo to wrap up a deal.
Bunye said Manila did not intend to brand the MILF as a terrorist organization so as to keep the peace process moving.
While Arroyo was seeking help, clashes continued in Central Mindanao, with at least 12 soldiers and separatists reported killed in heavy fighting that saw control over a rebel base change hands twice, according to both sides.
MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu said MILF fighters managed to dislodge government troops from a portion of the so-called Bulyok Complex in Pagalungan town of Maguindanao province after a two-hour gun battle before dawn. By daybreak, government troops unleashed a heavy barrage of mortar and howitzer fire and later regained control of the place, he admitted.
Asked why the MILF forces did not put up a fight to maintain control over the place they call “Islamic Center,” Kabalu explained said the pullout was part of their guerilla tactics and holding an area in a defensive manner is not part of it.
He said the counterstrike was the MILF’s way of proving their point that they could also inflict heavy damage despite the military’s superiority in terms of weaponry and other logistics.
Kabalu admitted that there was no reported casualties on the military’s side while one MILF fighter sustained minor injury.
But MILF fighters killed six soldiers and wounded two more during an ambush in Pindulunan in Pikit, North Cotabato at about 8 a.m., he claimed.
He further claimed that separatist fighters killed members of the government militia, called Cafgus) in a nearby barangay.
A military report made no mention of any battle in Pagalungan but claimed that a clash in nearby Datu Odin Sinsuat town ended with six MILF fighters killed and four soldiers wounded.
Regional army spokesman Maj. Julieto Ando said soldiers also recovered containers of gasoline, which the guerrillas apparently had planned to use to raze the army position, he said.
The attack capped a week of fighting on southern Mindanao island in which 16 people were killed, most of them civilians.
The military blamed MILF rebels for the bloodshed, which came after government troops overran a guerrilla stronghold in North Cotabato province earlier this month.
