NDF says government peace panel lying on resumption of peace talks

The National Democratic Front (NDF) yesterday assailed the Arroyo administration, specifically the head of the government panel negotiating peace with communist rebels, for “lying” about the resumption of formal peace talks.

In a statement, NDF peace panel spokesperson Fidel Agcaoili, who is also chairman of the NDF Human Rights Committee, said former labor secretary Nieves Confesor, who now heads the government peace panel, has been “flagrantly telling lies” about the informal talks held recently in Oslo, Norway.

Agcaoili said the Arroyo administration, through the press release of Confesor, committed “two big lies.”

He said Confesor falsely claimed that the government is ready to resume the formal peace negotiations with the NDF, while accusing the rebels of rejecting the ceasefire proposal.

The NDF said the government is offering as a “precondition” a prolonged ceasefire to resume formal peace talks between the parties.

However, the NDF maintained that such precondition entails the surrender of the rebels, pacification of the revolutionary forces, and scrapping of all previously signed bilateral agreements.

“During the informal talks in Oslo, Confesor engaged in self-contradictions from the beginning to the end,” Agcaoili said.

“On the one hand, she pretended to agree with the NDF panel on the need to reaffirm and comply with the aforesaid bilateral agreements prior to the resumption of formal meetings of the panels.”

Agcaoili said the negotiating panels couldn’t sign any agreement in Oslo.

The NDF lambasted Confesor for “spreading the lie” that the negotiating panels have agreed on an “undefined kind of ceasefire.”

Agcaoili said Confesor failed to trick the NDF negotiating panel into accepting a prolonged ceasefire.

“Failing to get the kind of prolonged ceasefire that she demanded, she rebuffed all other kinds of ceasefire, including the one for the Christmas and New Year holidays on humanitarian grounds and the one for the duration of formal meetings of the negotiating panels as a goodwill and confidence building measure,” he claimed.

Agcaoili also criticized Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita for declaring that the government can always declare a ceasefire unilaterally during the holidays.

He said the unilateral ceasefire declared by the government would be a deception and meant to cover the escalation of military and police operations against the rebels.

Agcaoili said the NDF negotiating panel is now recommending to its principal, the National Council of the NDF, the withdrawal of their previous offer of ceasefire for the duration of formal meetings of the negotiating panels.

“At any rate, the NDF has received word from sources in the Palace that the Arroyo regime is already planning to terminate the GRP-NDF peace negotiations and to blame the NDF for the termination,” Agcaoili said.