A new set of international peace observers will arrive here Wednesday to continue peace monitoring as the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) are winding up their 17-year peace talks.
International monitors observing government talks with Muslim rebels expressed confidence on Friday that efforts to end one of Asia’s bloodiest and longest insurgencies will survive derailing attempts by hardline guerrillas.
The Aquino administration and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) will sign by the end of March a final peace agreement, ending four decades of conflict in Mindanao and opening the way for development of the rich but impoverished island in southern Philippines.
The United States (US) and Canada congratulated the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) for the conclusion of negotiations on the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro last Saturday in Malaysia.
The Switzerland government on Saturday welcomes the signing of the Annex on Normalization and the Addendum on Bangsamoro Waters between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
Banking a little on superstition, President Benigno Aquino III knocked on a wooden table when asked if the normalization annex, the last of the four documents making up the blueprint for a final peace agreement between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), would be signed in the next few days.
Before the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) sealed a deal for wealth-sharing in the future Bangsamoro region in Mindanao, there were too many heart-stopping moments and too much hand wringing in Kuala Lumpur.
Formal talks between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in Kuala Lumpur will resume in July, government chief negotiator Miriam Coronel-Ferrer said in a statement released by the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (OPAPP) on Friday.
Some 26 children were recruited as soldiers, messengers and informants in conflict zones while dozens of other minors were slain and maimed in militant attacks and gunfights in the Philippines last year, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said in a report.
The negotiations between the government and Muslim rebels look to have hit a bump. The separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) is none too pleased that the latest round of exploratory talks ended in Kuala Lumpur last Thursday without the negotiating panels signing at least one of three annexes to the Bangsamoro Framework Agreement.
The family of a freed Australian hostage expressed hope on Monday that his kidnappers, including Abu Sayyaf bandits and rogue elements of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) who kept him in jungle captivity for 15 months, would be captured and punished so such ordeals would not be repeated.
The Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front will resume peace talks next week in Malaysia, even as followers of the Sulu sultanate are embroiled in conflict with Malaysian security forces there.
