Philippines, rebels agree to tentative truce

In this Tuesday, April 4, 2017 file photo, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte gestures while addressing army troopers during the 120th anniversary celebration of the Philippine Army at Fort Bonifacio in suburban Taguig city, east of Manila, Philippines.
In this Tuesday, April 4, 2017 file photo, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte gestures while addressing army troopers during the 120th anniversary celebration of the Philippine Army at Fort Bonifacio in suburban Taguig city, east of Manila, Philippines.

MANILA, Philippines -- Negotiators representing the government of the Philippines and communist rebels agreed to a temporary cease-fire Wednesday, moving one step closer to ending one of Asia's longest-running insurgencies.

The agreement was reached at peace talks in the Netherlands, two months after guerrillas killed three soldiers and nearly derailed the process.

"We have already agreed on the final outcome of the talks: lasting peace and sustainable development," said Jesus Dureza, the government negotiator. "This is not a case of one party giving in or giving up."

In addition, President Rodrigo Duterte, speaking before a gathering of prosecutors in Manila, invited Jose Maria Sison, the self-exiled Communist Party leader and Duterte's former college professor, to return to the Philippines to seek treatment for an unspecified illness.

"I said, 'You tell Sison, because he's sick, very sick, he can come home,'" Duterte said he told his representatives. "I'll give him freedom of movement. I'll even pay for his hospitalization."

In January, the government said it would formally ask the United States to remove Sison from its list of international terrorists. Duterte did not say whether such a request had been made.

Duterte abruptly ended negotiations in February after rebels killed and mutilated three soldiers.

He has called on the rebels to release any troops they have in custody and cease collecting so-called revolutionary taxes, which for years have helped finance their insurgency.

The rebel militia, known as the New People's Army, said it would immediately comply with the agreed terms and free a police officer, and three soldiers seized in raids in the country's south, according to Fidel Agcaoili, the communists' chief negotiator.

In exchange, Agcaoili called on the army to withdraw from at least a dozen towns in the southern island of Mindanao, where recent clashes have occurred.

The communists have waged war for 48 years throughout the country's poverty-stricken countryside. At least 35,000 soldiers, rebels and civilians have been killed in the fighting.

The rebels ended an earlier cease-fire in February after accusing the government of reneging on promises, including releasing jailed guerrillas and sending troops to rebel-held areas in violation of agreed upon terms.

Dureza, the government negotiator, said Wednesday that previous talks have "never gone this far before" and said he hoped hostilities would come to an end.

"The road to peace is never a paved one," he said. "It will be full of bumps and bends. Let us stay the course."

A Section on 04/06/2017

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