Manila Truce Plan Rejected by Guerrillas
Communist guerrilla negotiators today rejected a government proposal for the declaration of an immediate 30-day cease-fire while peace talks are in progress to halt a 17-year-old bloody insurgency.
In a statement released by the National Democratic Front, negotiators Saturnino Ocampo and Antonio Zumel also said that unless the government acts on their request for security guarantees and immunity from arrest, they “would find it exceedingly difficult to proceed with the talks.”
The National Democratic Front is the umbrella organization for the outlawed Communist Party of the Philippines, its 17,000-member New People’s Army and various left-wing groups.
Call for ‘Adjustment’
“The NDF takes the position that a cease-fire can only be effective and meaningful if it is situated within a comprehensive political settlement of the fundamental causes of the revolutionary armed struggle,” said the statement signed by Ocampo and Zumel.
Before a truce can be called, “an adjustment” of current operational policies, including the deployment of soldiers in known guerrilla-controlled territory, should be undertaken, it said.
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