Gov’t negotiators off to Oslo for talks with NDF

TARLAC CITY — Government negotiators will be leaving today for Oslo, Norway, for this year’s third round of formal peace talks with the communist-led National Democratic Front (NDF) in efforts to find a diplomatic solution to the 35-year-old Maoist insurgency.

Upon arriving in Oslo, Tarlac Gov. Jose Yap, senior consultant of the government peace panel, said they will be briefing rebel negotiators led by NDF panel chairman, former Catholic priest Luis Jalandoni, on the progress of the operationalization of the Joint Monitoring Committee (JMC) that has been tasked to oversee the implementation of the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL).

Yap’s position in the government panel is equivalent to that of Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founding supremo and NDF panel consultant Jose Ma. Sison.

The JMC’s operationalization was realized with the creation of a joint government-rebel secretariat last June 4 that now holds office in Quezon City.

The joint body is concurrently chaired by government lawyer Carlos Medina Jr. and rebel leader Fidel Agcaoili.

So far, over 50 complaints of murder, torture and harassment have already been lodged against several officers of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) before the JMC.

No charges have been filed yet against the rebel movement and its armed wing, the New People’s Army (NPA), even as Yap said that the JMC will ensure that "justice will be rendered where it is due."

He added that the NDF panel will also be appraised on the "confidence-building measures" undertaken by the government, particularly in processing the release of all political prisoners still languishing in jails across the country.