NDF hits gov’t for suspending immunity guarantees

BACOLOD CITY — The government’s suspension of the agreement on immunity and security guarantees for communist rebel negotiators was "invalid" because the National Democratic Front (NDF) has not abandoned the peace talks, the group’s chief negotiator said yesterday.

NDF peace panel head Luis Jalandoni warned the Arroyo administration could be liable if anything untoward happens to their nearly 100 negotiators and consultants due to the suspension of immunity.

"The NDF shall hold the Arroyo regime responsible for any harm done to any of those in the NDF list covered by the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees and those NDF-designated personnel in Joint Monitoring Committee and its Manila-based Joint Secretariat under the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law," said Jalandoni whose NDF is the political arm of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).

The immunity agreement had been granted to NDF negotiators, bodyguards and other staff to allow them to freely travel within the country to conduct consultations for the peace talks.

As this developed, the government said yesterday it had already informed 97 communist guerrilla leaders their immunity from arrest would be suspended in a month.

The NDF leaders were given 30 days’ notice on Wednesday on the suspension of immunity that had been secured when peace talks began in 1986, government peace negotiators said.

"Standing warrants of arrest can be served and the suspension of criminal proceedings against (the rebel negotiators) can be lifted," the government said in a statement.

They could face arrest for extortion and a string of attacks allegedly carried out by the communist group since it began its bloody Maoist guerrilla war against the government in 1969.

The communists said last month there was no sense pursuing peace talks with the Arroyo administration because it had become a "lame-duck" government as President Arroyo faces impeachment charges over allegations that she rigged the May 2004 presidential vote.

The government responded by suspending the safety guarantees.

Jalandoni in a statement accused the Arroyo government of lying in claiming that the NDF "withdrew" from or "abandoned" the peace negotiations.

The NDF, he stressed, "merely postponed" the formal talks of the panels in the peace negotiations to give the government time to "comply" with previous agreements and settle "certain prejudicial questions," such as the rebels’ continued inclusion on the list of terrorist organizations drawn up by the United States and European Union. — AFP, Paolo Romero, AP