Agenda Hitch Delays Peace Talks in Manila

Government and rebel representatives met for two hours Tuesday but failed to agree on an agenda for talks to end the Philippines’ 18-year-old Communist insurgency. The talks were adjourned until next week.

A month remains of a 60-day truce meant to facilitate the negotiations.

The two sides met behind closed doors, declaring later that they will study each other’s positions and meet again next Tuesday to try to reconcile differences on a common agenda.

After meeting with delegates of the Communist-led National Democratic Front, chief government negotiator Teofisto Guingona said his panel decided to work for agreement under the framework of “food and freedom, jobs and justice.”

The framework was proposed by Jose Diokno, a human rights campaigner and nationalist who stepped down as a government negotiator because of poor health.

In a letter, Diokno called on both sides to overlook ideological differences and to “guard against interference by any nation, especially the government of the United States, whose interests oppose those of our people.”

‘Priority Demands’

The front submitted 10 “priority demands” and asked the government to act on them immediately as a good-will gesture.

The demands included: release of remaining political prisoners; punishment of military and government officials guilty of human rights violations; an end to torture; disbanding of civil militias and private armies; a “thorough reorientation and reorganization” of the armed forces; compensation to victims of abuse; removal of police from military control, and punishment of those who killed a leftist labor leader in November.

Rebel negotiator Satur Ocampo said the demands were not preconditions but mostly steps that the Aquino government itself has pledged to take to rid the country of vestiges of former President Ferdinand E. Marcos’ 20 years in power.