The latest round of negotiations between the Peace Panels of the Government Republic of Philippines (GRP) and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in Malaysia broke the deadlock on contentious issue of ancestral domain and finally managed to settle the issue which was lingering on for more than three years. Now both parties are gearing up to resume the formal peace talks after an impasse of almost two years which could finally set the path to the signing of the Formal Peace Agreement between the GRP and MILF.
The stalled peace process between the GRP and MILF startled with the sudden decision of the Malaysian government to gradually pull out the Malaysian contingents from the International Monitoring Team (IMT). The Malaysian government as the main facilitators of the GRP- MILF peace process had been maintaining 41 IMT members from Malaysian Defense Forces and the rest of 19 IMT members have been from Brunei, Libya and Japan. Within two weeks after the announcement, the Malaysian government pulled out 29 of their IMT members including the head of the Mission of IMT in Mindanao.
Other than maintaining back channel negotiations, there is no credible advancement or breakthrough between the Government of the Philippines (GRP) and MILF to announce an official date of the recommencement of the adjourned formal peace talks or executive level talks between the Peace Panel representatives of the both sides.
The killing incident of eight villagers in Barangay Ipil, Maimbung Sulu by the Armed Forces of Philippines rocked the depleting, uncertain and vulnerable political and security structures of Mindanao.
The initiation of backchannel negotiations between GRP and MILF keep the ray of hope intact after the annulment of Exploratory Talks on 15th- 16th December 2007 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The MILF peace panel withdrew from the exploratory talks as the GRP added a phrase in their draft of resolving ancestral domain issue through constitutional process. According to MILF this phrase was not included in the draft that was submitted earlier and, above all, primarily both parties already agreed on consensus point’s agreement on the ancestral domain issue.
The political atmosphere was dominated by incessant efforts from all the stakeholders to resume the formal peace talks between the government (GRP) and MILF and review the implementation of 1996 Peace agreement between GRP and MNLF. Other than brief skirmishes in some areas, the overall security situation in Mindanao remained calm and peaceful as compared to the previous months.
A special meeting between the representatives of the GRP and MILF Peace Panels took place in Cyberjaya, Malaysia on September 27, 2007. During the meeting, the two parties expressed a common decision to move forward and reached a consensus in requesting the Malaysia, Brunie, Libya and Japan to extend the International Monitoring Team tour of duty for another 18 months till October of 2008. The special meeting took place after a call from the Malaysian government to start the resumption of talks as well as lobbying work in this regard was done by the non governmental organization.
The political scenarios in some parts of Autonomous Regions of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) moved towards increased volatility with numerous armed clashes between Armed Forces of Philippines (AFP) and Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) in the islands of Sulu and Basilan. With the lingering vulnerable situation in Basilan in the aftermath of the killing and mutilation of the dead bodies of Marines (AFP) and a Muslim Imam, the AFP and ASG entered into a number of armed clashes in MILF areas in Basilan as AFP continued its hunt to capture the culprits involved in the mutilations.
The civil society organizations and ceasefire mechanism structure of Government Republic of Philippines (GRP) and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) have played a very instrumental and pivotal role in preventing a war like situation between the Armed Forces of Philippines and Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces (BIAF) of MILF. The fire fight took place between Marines and BIAF in Albaraka, Basilan when following a false lead Marines entered MILF area without prior coordination with Local Government Unit (LGU) and MILF to track down the kidnappers of Italian priest Father Bossi.
