The Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) have edged nearer to a peace treaty after agreeing to a set of consensus points that could lead to less confrontation on the ground, officials say. At talks in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, at the end of April, both sides signed a document containing “decision points on principles” that they said would open public scrutiny of any final peace deal with the 12,000-strong MILF, which has been engaged in a bloody rebellion for the past three decades on the southern island of Mindanao. Among the 10 points in the document was consensus on creating a new autonomous political body to replace the current, often problematic, Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), comprising six provinces and two cities that is home to some 2.8 million Muslim Filipinos. ARMM was established in 1996 to provide the predominately Muslim population with some degree of self-rule after a peace agreement between the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), a former rebel group, and Manila, with the MNFL head as its first governor. Despite millions of dollars in government assistance and resources, the area remains mired in poverty, corruption and violence. Other key points in the document are the strengthening of Islamic courts, “assertion” of the people's basic rights - including those of the displaced - and sharing power and wealth in the mineral-rich region. “This agreement should serve as a memorandum for both sides of the general directions of the negotiations as we move closer to a peace agreement,” Teresita Deles, the government's chief presidential adviser on the peace talks, said. The transparent way in which the talks were being held could avoid further confusion that could lead to a new explosion of violence, and another round of displacements in the Mindanao region, she said. It would also serve to calm tensions on both sides, and allow greater access to humanitarian workers on the ground to help those still in dire need of assistance, Deles noted. “This generates more goodwill - to see evidence that despite the distance between our positions, there is substantive common ground that has in fact been engendered on the table,” she said. According to MILF chief negotiator Mohagher Iqbal, despite the consensus points, the two sides are still “worlds apart” in reaching a final agreement. MILF remained committed to the peace talks, and to the basic principles outlined in the consensus points, he said, but pointed out that the government had previously reneged on its promises, including the doomed proposed deal signed by both sides in 2008, which would have given them control over large swathes of the area they consider as “ancestral domain”. The deal was rejected by the Philippine Supreme Court, triggering violence and large-scale displacement. “The peace negotiations, however, are continuing, if limping,” Iqbal told IRIN. He didn't think a final peace deal would be signed in 2012.
