MILF Hits Stalled Peace Talks with GRP (tags)
The US based EPCC NEWS learned today from Cotabato City that a senior official of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front has expressed his doubt about the resumption of peace talks with the government by January in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, even as he has called for the release of all MILF members in prison. In in a statement issued Sunday to media sources in the Philippines said that MILF chief negotiator Mohagher Iqbal doubted whether that would happen. “Without a facilitator, how would the talks resume? The government's continued character assassination of the Malaysian facilitator is not doing any good to the peace process,” he said.
Gov’t downgrades peace talks, MILF says (tags)
Manila-- The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has described the replacement of Secretary Silvestre Afable as government chief negotiator with a non-cabinet member as a deliberate downgrading of the peace process by the government following Afable’s alleged resignation the other day. Jun Mantawil, head of the MILF peace panel secretariat, told Luwaran that while the MILF leadership has the highest respect for Father Eliseo Mercado Jr. as “a person, friend and as a priest” but he does not possess the authority that a cabinet member possesses.