PNP: No to truce with NPA

A senior police official urged the government yesterday not to declare a unilateral ceasefire with the communist rebels during the coming Christmas holidays.

Deputy Director General Virtus Gil, Philippine National Police chief of directorial staff, said that New People’s Army rebels should no longer be treated as political revolutionaries but as terrorists.

"I am not questioning the wisdom of what our higher officials say about this, but from my point of view, we need not declare a ceasefire against these bandits," Gil said.

He added that he and his colleagues in the PNP have tagged the NPA "communist terrorists."

The government traditionally declares a unilateral truce with both the NPA and the Muslim separatist insurgents during the Christmas season.

Police and military authorities noted, however, that the rebels usually take advantage of the ceasefire to strengthen their forces by stepping up recruitment and procuring more firearms.

PNP sources said launching an all-out war against the NPA would be a better option than a ceasefire.

The NPA, the military wing of the Maoist Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), has been waging an armed struggle against government since the early 70s.

Peace negotiations between the two sides bogged down last year following the assassination of Rep. Marcial Punzalan of Quezon and Rep. Rodolfo Aguinaldo of Cagayan believed staged by NPA urban hit squads.

Back-channel discussions to resume the talks were also imperiled after the United States and Philippine governments classified the NPA as a terrorist group.

Upon Washington’s prodding, various governments froze CPP assets in a bid to paralyze the rebel movement.

Citing intelligence reports, Gil said CPP founding chairman Jose Ma. Sison who has been in self-exile in the Netherlands, ordered an intensification of attacks against isolated military outposts, government installations and vital facilities such power and communication lines.

The Dutch embassy in Manila said the US government had sought the freeze on the CPP’s and Sison’s assets in the Netherlands after US authorities listed the party and the 12,000-strong NPA, as "foreign terrorist organizations."

"On the basis of Security Council resolution 1373, the Netherlands decided to freeze the assets (of the CPP and Sison)," the embassy said. said.

Meanwhile, Armed Forces of the Philippines spokesman Brig. Gen. Eduardo Purificacion said a freeze on the overseas assets of the CPP-NPA would adversely impact on the operations of the rebels, citing that a squeeze on funding leads to the weakening of any organization.

Purificacion said the military was updating its information on the properties of CPP-NPA, which may include legitimate businesses.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas Ople said Sison’s claims that the CPP-NPA has no assets "remains to be seen."

Ople said he hopes that the "back-channeling" may save the formal peace talks and reiterated that Sison could come back to the country.

National Security Adviser Roilo Golez said government intelligence agents had verified that the CPP-NPA and the National Democratic Front (NDF) have amassed funds from their extortion activities disguised as "revolutionary taxes."

Golez said intelligence reports have indicated that in 1999, the CPP-NPA accumulated P108 million, P93 million in 2000, P98 million in 2001 and P15 million so far this year.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell, in an article published on Aug. 9 in the Federal Gazette, designated the CPP-NPA as terrorist organizations "as defined under US law." The Federal Gazette is the official US government gazette.

The US-led global anti-terror coalition had set up a legal basis for the European allies of the United States to stop financial support to communist organizations.

The US State Department’s designation makes it illegal for US citizens

to provide support to the CPP-NPA, which maintains ties with leftist groups in western countries.

It also mandates that financial institutions must block assets and make representatives of the CPP inadmissible to the US or subject to deportation.

Powell said the US government had decided on the designation of the CPP-NPA after an "exhaustive review" of the group’s violent activities. The CPP-NPA had killed, injured or kidnapped numerous Filipinos, including government officials, he said.

On the other hand, Sison rejected suggestions that he, the CPP, the NDF, the NPA and exiled communist leaders have assets overseas, saying they do "not maintain any amount of money in the US and elsewhere."

Sison, 64, who has lived in the Netherlands for more than a decade, condemned the Dutch government’s decision as a "violation of an individual’s rights."

More than 40,000 people are estimated to have died in a 33-year-old communist insurgency that aims to establish a Marxist state in the largely Catholic Philippines.

The CPP, founded by Sison in 1968, was legalized by Congress in 1992, but the NPA has continued its guerrilla activities in rural areas.

Members of the CPP and associated groups like the NDF have been living in the Netherlands for a number of years but have not been granted residency or protection.

Sison fled the Philippines in the late 1980s during the administration of then President Corazon Aquino, who had freed him and other political detainees after the first people power revolution in 1986. Sison spent nine years in prison.

The Dutch internal service has been watching Sison since 1992 and alleges he is still the leader of rebel forces responsible for hundreds of deaths in the Philippines every year.