The government issued the
upbeat forecast as the latest round of peace talks with the 12,000-strong Moro
Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) began in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur.
"We are on the brink of
layering the written predicates that can frame the process of building trust as
we usher in an era of peace, of hope and of recovery," chief government
negotiator Marvic Leonen said at the start of the talks, according to a
Philippine government statement.
"We cannot postpone any
longer. Now is the time," he said.
"To state that what we
hope to be able to do in the next few days is historical is definitely an
understatement."
Mohagher Iqbal, chief
negotiator for the MILF, said in his opening remarks that negotiations were
"now on the home stretch", according to the statement.
However he warned a resolution
must be reached soon, after previous false dawns in the peace process had led
to more violence.
"If we cannot conclude it
soon successfully, now that we are at the brink of the exercise, we will be in
trouble," Iqbal said, warning of "spoilers" who may want to
derail the peace efforts for their own interests.
The government and the rebels
said ahead of the talks there was a strong spirit of cooperation following
months of intense diplomacy.
But they also conceded many of
the issues that derailed previous peace efforts had still not been agreed upon.
Among the toughest points to be
resolved are the extent of the MILF's power in an envisioned autonomous region
in the southern island of Mindanao, and the exact terms of proposed wealth
sharing in that area.
Mindanao is home to vast
untapped reserves of gold, copper and other minerals, as well as being one of
the country's most important farming regions.
There are roughly four million
Muslims in Mindanao, which they see as their ancestral homeland dating back to
Islamic sultanates established before Spanish Christians arrived in the 1500s.
The MILF and other Muslim rebel
groups have been fighting for independence or autonomy in Mindanao since the
early 1970s.
The rebellion has claimed more
than 150,000 lives, most in the 1970s when all-out war raged, and left large
parts of mineral-rich Mindanao in deep poverty.
The MILF is the biggest and
most important rebel group left, after the Moro National Liberation Front
signed a peace pact with the government in 1996.
Since opening peace talks with
the government in 2003, the MILF has said it is willing to accept autonomy
rather than independence.
The group came close to a peace
deal with the government in 2008, under the previous administration led by
then-president Gloria Arroyo, that would have given them control over 700
townships and villages.
But amid furious protests from
leading Christian politicians in the south, as well as the influential Catholic
Church, the Supreme Court ruled that deal was unconstitutional.
Two MILF commanders reacted to
the court order by leading attacks on mainly Christian villages in Mindanao,
with the unrest killing 400 people and displacing about 750,000 others.
Leonen told reporters in Manila
this month the government had been consulting with officials in the south as
well as leading national politicians to ensure their support for the planned
new deal and avoid a repeat of 2008.
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