Yan to MILF: Let’s talk peace

COTABATO CITY – Peace adviser Manuel Yan urged the Moro Islamic Liberation Front yesterday to immediately reactivate its peace panel for the GRP-MILF talks and for both sides to discuss anew peaceful solutions to nagging security problems in the south.

However, Yan, in calling on the MILF to return to the negotiating table, said the government will not replace GRP chief negotiator Edgardo Batenga, as they had urged, as chair of the government’s peace panel.

"We don’t have to change him," Yan said over Catholic station dxMS here, without elaborating further.

The MILF has asked for the replacement of Batenga, citing that most of the low-level agreements, including peace pacts for limited areas, he forged with the front have not been religiously complied with by government forces in the field.

"We need a negotiator whose authority in negotiating with us is well respected by the military. There have been many low-level agreements the past chairmen of the GRP panel signed with the MILF that were violated by the military again and again," said Eid Kabalu, who spoke on behalf of the MILF’s central committee.

Yan said Malacañang still has no plan of replacing Batenga. "Why do we have to change the chairman of our panel?" Yan asked.

Instead, Yan, who, as GRP panel chairman, helped broker the vaunted Sept. 2, 1996 truce between the government and the Moro National Liberation Front, said the MILF should reactivate its peace panel immediately to jumpstart the negotiations.

"If they can reconstitute their panel, we can talk again. The two panels can discuss solutions to the security problems in troubled areas," Yan said.

The MILF’s peace panel was disbanded by rebel chieftain Salamat Hashim himself after the military’s July 9 capture of Camp Abubakar, the front’s last bastion in Maguindanao. – John Unson