AFP tells NDF consultant to go home and present themselves to courts

From the Philippine News Agency (Feb 7): AFP tells NDF consultant to go home and present themselves to courts

With President Rodrigo Duterte's lifting of the ceasefire and termination of the peace talks, National Democratic Front (NDF) consultants should immediately go home and present themselves to courts who have taken "judicial notice" of the Chief Executive's pronouncements.

"The negotiators should surrender themselves to the courts where, we submit, have taken 'judicial notice' of the pronouncement of the President terminating the talks," said Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) public affairs office chief Col. Edgard Arevalo on Tuesday.

Failing to do that, these NDF negotiators will be deemed to have “jumped bail” and thereupon may be validly arrested, he added.

"The negotiators enjoy temporary liberty on account of bail granted by the courts at the behest and the intercession of the Government of the Republic of the Philippines. The grant of that temporary liberty is to freely travel in the Philippines and abroad solely to participate in the peace negotiations," Arevalo noted.

And with the President's declaration of terminating the peace talks with the NPA, he said, it effectively informs the negotiators from both sides of the table to “wind up the activities and come home immediately."

He also said these NDF negotiators cannot validly invoke the Joint Agreement on Security and Immunity Guarantee (JASIG) as it only applies to those who are in hiding.

"(JASIG) applies only to those who are in hiding whom the government invites to participate in the peace talks. And to encourage them to go out, we provide them 'Safe Conduct Passes," Arevalo said.

"The negotiators in question are serving prison terms or are at least charged with non-bailable crime, hence, they are out of prison not by virtue of “Safe Conduct Passes” but of bail," he added.

Arevalo stressed that these NDF negotiators are covered by the conditions of bail that imposes certain conditions chief of which to report their whereabouts pertaining to the peace talks.

"With the termination of the peace talks, the ground for their temporary liberty ceases to exist. They should abide with the provisions of bail and not that of JASIG," he added.

http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=1&sid=&nid=1&rid=961736