2 Government negotiators in Oslo for talks with NDF

Two government negotiators are now in Oslo, Norway for "back-channel" talks with the communist National Democratic Front (NDF), presidential adviser on the peace process Eduardo Ermita revealed yesterday.

Ermita said Agrarian Reform Secretary Hernani Braganza and former justice secretary Silvestre Bello III left for Norway late last week to speak with communist leader Jose Ma. Sison, who has recently threatened to scuttle the peace talks if the left doesn’t get what it wants.

Braganza and Bello went to Norway to confer with Sison on the agenda of the peace talks which appear to be stalled on the issue of socio-economic reforms.

However, the government has agreed to "confidence-building" measures to persuade the communists to agree to hasten the talks.

One of the measures is the release on bail of six rebels who are accused of assassinating two members of a political clan in Mamburao, Mindoro Occidental.

"The President has already approved the release on bail and on recognizance of the six detainees which the Communist Party of the Philippines and the NDF have asked to be released," Ermita said.

Ermita said the government wants to discuss the final framework of the final peace agreement even as both sides negotiate for socio-economic and political reforms.

The talks, which started in March 2001, are divided into four stages with the aim of producing comprehensive pacts on human rights, socio-economic reforms, political and constitutional reforms and a final agreement on ending hostilities and disbanding rebel forces.

Both sides have already signed a human rights pact but the talks were stalled on the socio-economic reforms after the government withdrew its negotiators in protest over the continued assassinations by communist hit squads.

The government withdrew from talks in June last year after the assassinations of Quezon Rep. Marcial Punzalan and Cagayan Rep. Rodolfo Aguinaldo.

The government claimed that the two assassinations were violations of the human rights pact that both sides signed two years ago but the talks were resumed after the back-channel initiative of Speaker Jose de Venecia.

"When the talks started last March, among the agreements was to tackle each of the three reform areas in six months – for a total of 18 months," Ermita said.

But the government now wants to hasten the talks in accord with a preliminary agreement reached when De Venecia initiated "back-channel" talks with Sison and NDF panel chairman Luis Jalandoni in several meetings in November and December.

"But in our discussion with Speaker de Venecia, we agreed to accelerate the talks to March 31 or April, at the latest," Ermita said.

Sison and Jalandoni said they would have to consult with the entire leadership of the NDF, which is the umbrella organization of 31 communist groups, including the CPP and the New People’s Army.

"That is the only change in the format," Ermita said. "(The talks) were stalled at the moment but the negotiation will definitely move on."

Both sides have forged at least 10 separate agreements on various issues over the past six years, most of them during the Ramos administration.

Among the agreements are the controversial Joint Agreement on Security and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) and the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL).

The JASIG allowed Sison and Jalandoni, who are now Dutch citizens, to use Dutch passports during the peace talks.

The CARHRIHL, on the other hand, affirmed government commitment to the rights of political detainees.

In 2000, the talks were snagged after the Estrada administration refused to recognize the CARHRIHL because it called for the release of rebels who were convicted for the 1989 assassination of US Army Col. James Rowe.

The government released more than 100 political prisoners but refused to release cadres Donato Continente and Juanito Itaas.