No peace deal with rebels in Philippines

Philippine government will not sign a peace deal with country's largest rebel group after attacks in South last week.

A protester shouts anti-government slogans during a peace rally in front of a mosque in Manila, Aug 22 2008.

MANILA // The Philippines government will not sign a peace deal with the country's largest rebel group, irrespective of a Supreme Court ruling on its legality, Jesus Dureza said today. The comments from Mr Dureza, the chief government spokesman, signal the end of a territorial agreement reached last month between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which is fighting for partial self-rule in the mineral-rich Mindanao region. Analysts said while the deal was hastily drawn-up, its scrapping would delay resolving by months, and possibly years, the decades-long conflict in the south of the Christian-majority nation.

"We are not going to sign this memorandum of agreement in its present form," Mr Dureza said in a television interview. "With due respect to the Supreme Court ... government in the executive department would like to make this very, very clear and there should be no nuancing about this." The agreement, which proposed expanding an autonomous Muslim region in Mindanao, provoked a storm of protest from powerful Christian interests and a challenge in the Supreme Court.

MILF was angered by opposition to the deal and attacked towns in the South on Monday, killing about 40 people. The military has retaliated against their positions with air strikes and gunfire. One officer said as many as 100 rebels might have been killed, according to unconfirmed reports. It is the worst violence for years in the Mindanao region, where the rebellion has prevented any significant development of some of the richest mineral and hydrocarbon resources in South-east Asia.

Mr Dureza said the violence, and reservations expressed by Supreme Court judges at a preliminary hearing, had persuaded the government to revisit the deal. MILF leaders have said re-negotiating the deal was out of the question. The Philippine government and the 11,000-member MILF have been in on-off talks for more than a decade on how to give Muslims more self-rule in the South. At least 120,000 people have been killed in 40 years of conflict on Mindanao.

Analysts said quick negotiations were necessary to prevent the violence from getting out of hand. "Right now, both sides are beating their breast," said Tom Green at the Pacific Strategies and Assessments risk consultancy. "They are going to have to do a sit-down to keep a lid on the situation and get a conversation going again. They will have to do that relatively soon." Despite the ongoing violence, an all-out war is not considered likely as neither side has the resources to deliver a knock out blow. But analysts say low-level skirmishes and bombing campaigns could persist, making investors wary of the region.

* Reuters