More Ceasefire Violations in Mindanao, Pressure Mounts as Deadline in Peace Talks Nears

By Zachary Abuza

The ongoing investigations and allegations that MILF Chairman Ebrahim el Haj Murad was involved in the mid-October bombings that rocked central Mindanao have led to a fraying of the peace process. Already under strain from a year and a half’s worth of deadlocked negotiations, 2006 has seen a number of breakdowns in the ceasefire that has held fairly well since 2004. On 26 October, Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) helicopters violated the ceasefire by strafing MILF positions in Lanao del Sur province. Sunday saw yet another violation. According to the AFP, a group of MILF attacked an AFP unit in Shariff Aguak, Maguindanao. Eid Kabalu, the MILF spokesman, claims that pro government paramilitaries, known as civilian volunteers' organization (CVO) provoked the attack and were then joined by AFP mortar fire. The AFP initially claimed that four MILF were killed, though there was no confirmation of this by the rebels on their website. In a separate incident last Thursday, security forces raided a welding shop that the MILF used as an armaments factory that manufactured RPG-2s. The AFP claimed that the shop was “owned by a top-ranking” MILF leader, though without disclosing whom.

Why all the recent breakdowns in the ceasefire? In part it is a negotiating ploy by both sides who want to remind the other of the consequences of a deadlock in the peace talks. Following the breakdown of talks in Kuala Lumpur on 6-7 September, the GRP side requested until 31 October to present a new proposal on Ancestral Domain. The MILF, on their website this weekend, expressed doubt that the government was going to present a meaningful proposal with real concessions. Both sides are raising the specter of a renewed conflict.

The bombings in central Mindanao from 10-15 October were clearly the work of the ASG and JI; but it is also clear that there was some MILF hand in them. The ASG have no real presence in that part of the country and the operations could not have been executed without a degree of MILF complicity. There is no proof that Murad gave the order, though clearly the MILF may have wanted to send a not so subtle reminder to the government about the consequences of the stalled talks. Hardliners in the MILF may simply want to scuttle the talks. The criminal charges leveled at Murad, however, are going to prove to be a disastrous mistake on the part of the government.

The normally reticent, but powerful second in command of the MILF, Aleem Abdul Aziz S. Mimbantas, issued a rare public statement on 25 October. The statement characterizes the charges as “baseless” and “character assassination.” “In the light of the impasse at the peace talks, the latest move by the Philippine government is a clearly a ploy to pressure the MILF to return to the negotiating table and to use these trumped up charges as leverage and as a bargaining tool to impose its unacceptable conditions in the negotiations on the Front.” Mimbantas continued with a threat: “As Vice Chairman for Military Affairs of the Front… I am serving notice to the Philippine Government that we consider this latest affront… no less than an act of hostile provocation whose dire consequences will widen the cleavage between the MILF and the Philippine Government.” “The Philippine Government thus should ponder over the serious implications of this provocative act. For this will definitely and detrimentally affect the peace process and hinder its movement forward…”

The threat came as the Australian Ambassador for Counter Terrorism Mike Smith, came to Mindanao to inspect Philippine progress in CT operations amid growing concern that the Southern Philippines the soft underbelly for regional security.

In other news from Mindanao, the AFP announced that an additional 1,500 troops would be deployed in Jolo against the Abu Sayyaf and members of JI, bringing the total to 7,500.

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