Palace: Reds looking for excuse to scuttle talks by cutting truce

From InterAksyon (Jan 2): Palace: Reds looking for excuse to scuttle talks by cutting truce

Malacanang on Wednesday accused the Communist Party of the Philippines of looking for ways to scuttle peace talks when it decided to terminate what would have been the longest ceasefire between the rebels and government. Earlier in the day, the CPP said it was calling off the ceasefire -- originally scheduled to run from December 20 to January 15 -- at 11:59 p.m. Wednesday because of the government’s failure to formally announce a similar truce as agreed on during a December 18 meeting in The Netherlands. The end of the communist-declared ceasefire coincides with the end of the Armed Forces of the Philippines’ suspension of offensive military operations against the rebels.

"It’s unfortunate that the CPP-NDF-NPA (National Democratic Front-New People’s Army) would change its mind so soon after they declared a statement calling for a ceasefire,” Malacanang spokesman Edwin Lacierda said. However, he added, “that is expected from somebody who cannot blame themselves, and they know that a ceasefire of that (duration) would be detrimental to them so they decided to cut it short and blame government."

"(The) CPP-NDF-NPA has always been making excuses. The first excuse was they wanted the number of their political consultants freed, we said we agreed on a Jasig (Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees) list but their Jasig list was corrupted. Now, they’re coming up with other stumbling blocks to peace," Lacierda said.

The CPP formally declared the ceasefire effective on December 20. However, except for a statement issued by the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process on the agreement for the December 20 to January 15 ceasefire, there was no formal government declaration extending the military’s SOMO. Following an earlier recommendation by Luis Jalandoni, chairman of the NDF peace negotiating panel, the CPP announced the end of the ceasefire, citing “the failure of the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GPH) to comply with the agreement last December 17-18 to extend its own ceasefire order to January 15.”

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/51770/palace-reds-looking-for-excuse-to-scuttle-talks-by-cutting-truce