OVP: Robredo not in talks with Reds, has no plans nor authority for that
MANILA, Philippines — Vice President Leni Robredo’s office said Tuesday that it is not holding peace talks with communist rebels, nor will it hold peace negotiations with them.
Simply put, that is not the vice president's job.
"While peace talks are crucial in resolving this decades-long conflict, they must be conducted through official, formal channels that the OVP is not part of," Robredo’s spokesperson Barry Gutierrez said in a statement.
READ: Vice President Leni Robredo’s spokesperson Barry Gutierrez says their office ‘is not engaged, has no intention of engaging’ in direct peace talks with communist rebels. | via @XaveGregorio pic.twitter.com/7IAzM74ACA
— Philstar.com (@PhilstarNews) December 15, 2020
He added that Robredo has maintained that position since peace talks between the government and the communist rebels were suspended in 2017 "contrary to the hysterical claims in fake news posts being spread aggressively on social media."
President Rodrigo Duterte, who restarted talks in 2016, has since said that he is longer interested in negotiations. He also said that there will be no more ceasefires with the Communist Party of the Philippines and New People's Army under his administration.
Gutierrez was reacting to a statement made by Sen. Bong Go, who expressed his concern over a supposed proposal for Robredo’s office to spearhead peace talks with communist rebels.
Gutierrez advised Go to verify the information that he reacts to.
Over the weekend, Robredo herself disowned posts which linked her to communist rebels.
“It gets crazier and crazier. Now I am being red-tagged. None of the allegations here are true,” said Robredo, who has been the subject of so much false information online.
The National Democratic Front of the Philippines, which represents communist rebels in peace talks, raised in September the possibility of holding discussions with opposition parties, particularly the Liberal Party, which Robredo heads.
"Prospects for resuming the peace negotiations after Duterte, whether he is ousted or he finishes his term, are possible and desirable," the CPP quotes NDFP interim panel chair Julie de Lima as saying then.
Neither the CPP nor the NDFP has said that this was anything more than a possibility.
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