In a statement, the MCPA accused the U.S. government of conspiring with the Arroyo administration in using the carrot and stick approach to undermine the Moro people’s revolutionary struggle for self-determination. The peace talks supposedly represent the carrot, and the U.S. troops represent the stick.
The group agreed with the observations raised by Kawangib about the presence of foreign troops in RP-U.S. Balikatan exercises noting that they were regularly sighted near mining operations and mineral exploration areas specifically involving strategic minerals like fossil oil and precious metals.
The MCPA said in Maguindanao, a couple of years ago, U.S. military advisers together with their Philippine counterparts in the Balikatan exercises were seen accompanying foreign mining technicians and engineers collecting mineral samples in areas where the exercises were taking place, thereby lending credence to the assertion that U.S. troops and their Filipino counterparts are there to provide security to U.S. mining experts studying the possible existence of strategic minerals in the MILF-controlled area.
The MCPA said the Philippine government, which is acting within the peace agenda and framework of the U.S. government, has objected to the MILF proposal regarding the inclusion of mining areas in Mindanao, which are currently being explored and exploited by transnational mining corporations of the United States, Australia and Canada, in the coverage of territories of the proposed Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE).
The MILF-proposed BJE, which is also being referred to as the Bangsamoro State, will supposedly have powers and the authority to ensure that the Moro people would be able to manage their economy and their development with little interference from the central government.
The Moro revolutionary group said the BJE will establish its own internal security force, independent from the Philippine National Police (PNP), which will be tasked with the enforcement of law and order. The BJE will also have its own justice and educational systems, auditing, taxation and fiscal systems, and the authority to conduct its own foreign trade and commerce. Buat said the BJE will also pave the way for the dismantling if not gradual phase out of GRP troops currently deployed in Bangsamoro areas.
However, just recently the Macapagal-Arroyo government directed the AFP to set up military outposts in areas where there are mining operations, especially in areas being claimed by the Moro people as part of their ancestral domain and therefore included in their political struggle for self-determination and genuine development.
Political experts closely monitoring the developments in the ongoing peace talks between the GRP-MILF are pessimistic about the prospects of the two parties signing a final peace agreement by June 2008.
They said the principal obstacle here is the U.S. government, which wants to control the outcome of the peace talks in favor of the U.S. transnational agenda in the South by coopting the MILF through the sham peace negotiation or through the brutal application of U.S.-led state terror against the Moro people. (Bulatlat.com)
