From the Star Online (Jun 6): MILF: Misuari will not be able to derail peace process
KUALA LUMPUR: The former chairman of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), Nur Misuari, will not succeed in his attempt to derail the southern Philippine peace process which Malaysia is facilitating.
Chairman of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Murad Ebrahim, whose group is in peace talks with the Philippine government, said the majority of the people in southern Philippines had expressed their support to the framework peace agreement that both parties signed last October.
“Nur Misuari is quite critical of the framework agreement, but the overwhelming support of the Bangsamoro people and the international community to the framework agreement is a very strong signal that the majority of the people welcome this agreement,” Murad said in response to a question during a plenary session titled “Will peace hold in Mindanao” at the 27th Asia-Pacific Roundtable.
The three-day event that ended yesterday was jointly organised by the Asean Institute of Strategic and International Studies (Isis) and Isis Malaysia.
Misuari has condemned the framework agreement which he said had left the people of southern Philippines shortchanged and has supported claims on Sabah by the self-styled Sulu sultanate whose followers mounted an armed incursion into the state in February.
Murad said the MNLF, which Misuari used to lead and which the MILF broke away from, was now split into four groups.
“The other three groups have already expressed their support for the framework agreement.”
Murad noted that Misuari had also failed in his bid to be elected as governor of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao during the Philippine mid-term elections last month.
Philippine Presidential Adviser to the peace process Secretary Teresita Quintos Deles, replying to a question on the issue of the Philippine claim on Sabah which resurfaced following the incursion into the state, said that the matter needed to be resolved separately.
“The peace process is one to help resolve an internal conflict, and there is no way that the peace process can resolve a conflict or a problem in which the area involved (Sabah) is currently under the political jurisdiction of another country (Malaysia),” she said.
Murad said that following the signing of the framework agreement, both the MILF and the Philippine government were working to draw up the three annexes that would contain details about the autonomous Bangsamoro region which they hope to be in place by 2016.
“Work on the first two annexes on power-sharing and wealth-sharing are almost 95% complete, while the third which is on the normalisation process is 60% ready.”
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2013/6/6/nation/13204618&sec=nation
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