CPP to Aquino: Are you interested in peace talks?

(Updated 6 p.m.) The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) on Thursday raised doubts about President Benigno Simeon "Noynoy" Aquino III's seriousness in resuming peace talks with communist rebels. In an article posted on its website, the CPP said Aquino "completely failed" to address the issue in his inaugural speech Wednesday. "Neither has Aquino declared in any of his previous policy statements and speeches any intention of resuming the peace negotiations. The only thing the new reactionary president has done related to the peace talks is to appoint as Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process, Teresita Deles, a pseudo-progressive who once held the same position in the previous regime before parting ways with (former President Gloria) Arroyo," it said. It added Deles was no help at all to the peace process, as her government peace panel merely tried to convince the revolutionary movement to disarm and surrender. During the campaign period, Aquino repeatedly declared that he will ensure dialogues with all stakeholders in the peace process to ensure that there will not be a repeat of the violent incidents that resulted after the Arroyo administration botched its memorandum of agreement with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) expanding the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. In 2008, the Supreme Court ruled the MOA-AD unconstitutional and directed the Arroyo government to conduct public consultations with respect to the peace negotiations in accordance with the right to information. "We will advance a peace dialogue with all the stakeholders, hopefully simultaneously. Therefore it will be inclusive and transparent to all parties; that is the only reasonable way we can get everyone to agree on a common goal, if we really strive to induce trust by making make the whole process transparent," Aquino said in a sortie in Zamboanga City last March. Deles had also said she wants to resume peace negotiations with both the MILF and the CPP-NPA-NDF. Oplan Bantay Laya In the same statement, the CPP said Filipinos would have wanted Aquino to reverse his predecessor's policy of fooling around with and eventually abandoning the peace negotiations. "With the US-designed Oplan Bantay Laya spanning the entire nine and half years of its rule, the puppet Arroyo regime relied on fascist brutal force and vicious psywar to suppress the revolutionary armed movement, wage a campaign of impunity against social activists and critics, and terrorize the masses," it said. The CPP said it would appear that the "new puppet regime" is under the direction of its US imperialist master to adhere more closely to the US Counterinsurgency Guide, belittle peace negotiations and use it only as a tactic to inveigle the revolutionary movement to surrender. "The US government is more interested in seeing the new US-Aquino regime intensify its counterrevolutionary war of suppression, coupled with deceiving the people through psywar and shallow political gimmickry," it said. Start of talks Peace talks with the National Democratic Front (NDF) started during the incumbency of Aquino's mother, the late President Corazon Aquino, in 1986. Talks broke down following the January 1987 Mendiola massacre. It was during the time of President Fidel Ramos (1992-1998) that talks progressed, with both sides signing The Hague Joint Declaration in 1992 and the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) in 1995. During the short-lived presidency of Joseph Estrada, both sides completed the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL). Talks have stalled since August 2004. But the communist group said that the NDF maintains a policy of remaining open to peace negotiations "with the reactionary Philippine government as long as the latter reciprocates such openness, commits to upholding all previous agreements in the peace process, and engages without preconditions in negotiation to address the problems which are at the root of the ongoing armed conflict." — with Jam Sisante/RSJ/KBK, GMANews.TV