Refugee Crisis in Philippines as Peace Deal Is at Risk

From the New York Times (Mar 10): Refugee Crisis in Philippines as Peace Deal Is at Risk

The Philippine military is fighting Islamic militants on two fronts in the country’s south, with recent battles having left dozens dead and driven more than 82,000 people from their homes, according to government officials and international organizations. An aid worker said a “growing humanitarian crisis” was underway in camps for people who had fled the violence.

The intensified fighting is taking place as lawmakers in Manila are debating a bill that would formalize the provisions of a landmark peace deal reached a year ago with the country’s largest rebel organization.

Last March, the rebels of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front agreed to lay down their weapons in return for the creation of a Muslim-dominated autonomous region in the southern Philippines. Under the deal, the newly established area would receive a generous portion of local tax revenue.

The deal was put in jeopardy in January, when the Philippine National Police conducted a raid in the small southern town of Mamasapano to capture several internationally wanted terrorism suspects. That botched operation, which resulted in a firefight with some members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and left 44 police officers dead, has generated harsh public criticism of the peace agreement.

The Moro Islamic Liberation Front has agreed to cooperate with government officials investigating the January incident. But a smaller breakaway group called the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters, which was also involved in the firefight, has rejected the peace deal and continues to fight the military.

The military offensive against that splinter group has killed 73 rebels and four government soldiers in recent weeks, the military said on Monday. An estimated 82,070 people have fled their homes in Maguindanao, a province on the island of Mindanao, where the fighting is taking place, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

People in evacuation centers say the military has been using artillery to flush out the rebels, who have used guerrilla tactics and attempted to blend in with the local population, according to Lyca Sarenas, a program manager in Mindanao for the charitable organization Oxfam.

“The situation in the evacuation centers is getting graver and graver by the day,” Ms. Sarenas said. “They have very little food and water and limited access to toilets, and their numbers are growing exponentially. We have a growing humanitarian crisis in Mindanao that is largely being overlooked.”

On Sulu, an island just west of Mindanao, the military has been conducting a separate offensive against the Abu Sayyaf, a small but high-profile Islamic group that has kidnapped dozens of Filipinos and foreigners in the last decade. The military reports that 63 of that group’s fighters and 10 Philippine soldiers have been killed since the offensive began in November.

One analyst said the offensive against the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters was partly intended to send a message to the largest rebel organization about sticking to the peace deal. “They are sending a strong signal to the Moro Islamic Liberation Front to pursue peace and not go the way of lawlessness,” said Rommel C. Banlaoi, the executive director of the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research.

The military estimates that the Bangsamoro group has 300 to 400 fighters, but Mr. Banlaoi’s organization puts the figure at more than 1,000, with as many as 10,000 civilian sympathizers in the area.

“It is impossible to eliminate the B.I.F.F. through military means because the source of their rebellion is the political, economic and social injustices done to the communities where they operate,” Mr. Banlaoi said. “The military can neutralize some of their members, but they cannot eliminate the group.”

The Philippine military has said that foreign fighters from Indonesia and Pakistan appear to have joined the Bangsamoro group in its battles against the government. On Sunday, soldiers retrieved the body of another “foreign-looking individual,” according to the military.

“He does not look Asian,” Lt. Col. Willie Manalang, the Philippine Marine Corps commander at the battle site, said of the body. “He could be one of the foreign terrorists who were coddled by the B.I.F.F.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/11/world/asia/philippines-battling-rebels-on-2-fronts-setting-off-refugee-crisis.html?_r=0