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Press Statement
29 August 2009
RESUMPTION OF FORMAL TALKS IS STILL POSSIBLE
IF GRP RESPECTS AND COMPLIES WITH JASIG
By Prof. Jose Maria Sison
Chief Political Consultant
NDFP Negotiating Panel
It is still possible to resume the formal talks in the GRP-NDFP peace
negotiations if the GRP respects and complies with the Joint Agreement on
Safety and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG). As soon as possible, the GRP and
NDFP negotiating panels, with their respective lawyers, should meet in
Oslo in order to put in writing the most expeditious methods of removing
the impediments on NDFP consultants.
This meeting has been proposed by the NDFP negotiating panel through the
Norwegian government because the GRP has not fulfilled the following
commitments it made last June 15.
1. To respect and comply with the JASIG and remove within the month of
July the impediments imposed by the GRP on the NDFP consultants so that
these consultants
can participate in preparations for the Oslo meetings that were slated to
start on August 28;
2. To let the lawyers of the GRP discuss and agree with the lawyers of the
NDFP on the
most expeditious methods of removing the impediments on the basis of
precedents in the time of GRP President Ramos;
.
3. To use the expeditious release of Dan Borjal in 1997 to serve as the
model for releasing detained NDFP consultants;
.
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4. To withdraw all trumped up
charges used by GRP to detain NDFP consultants and issue warrants of
arrest against NDFP panelists, consultants and other JASIG-protected
persons; and
.
5. To release immediately those detainees whose release was ordered as
goodwill measures by Gloria M. Arroyo in 2001 and 2004
The GRP has not respected and complied with the JASIG. Instead, the
militarist clique of Executive Eduardo Ermita and OPAPP Secretary Avelino
Razon have exerted their best efforts to undermine and negate the JASIG,
to reinterpret it onesidedly and convert it into a tool of Oplan Bantay
Laya, to generate further impediments and in brief to sabotage the peace
process as a way of addressing the roots of the armed conflict and laying
the basis for a just and lasting peace
The militarists defied the courts that ordered the release of Elizabeth
Principe and for two weeks they tried to prevent her release. She was
eventually released because of the clamor for her release by human rights
organizations and many people. Then, the militarists claimed that they
were responsible for her release.
They caused the issuance of a temporary release order of six months in a
malicious maneuver to make Randall Echanis a hostaged consultant. They
have issued sham safe conduct passes whose text incriminates Rafael
Baylosis and Vicente Ladlad and serves as judgment of conviction and death
warrants against them.
The GRP has not only deliberately made a zero compliance with the June 15
agreement but has further violated the JASIG and generated new
impediments. So far the GRP has not shown any serious interest in resuming
the formal talks. The Arroyo regime is preoccupied by serving the
interests of foreign and domestic plunderers, wallowing in bureaucratic
corruption and unleashing the most vicious forms of reactionary violence
against the people and the revolutionary forces.###
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