Left-wing rebels in the Philippines (Photo: Yahoo News) Hanoi (VNA) - ThePhilippine government and the left-wing rebels have agreed to resume the peacetalks to end the 48-year-old insurgency in the Philippines, announced PresidentialAdviser on the Peace Process Jesus Dureza on March 12.
In a statement posted on his Facebookpage, Dureza said that the fourth round of talks between the Philippinegovernment and the New People's Army/National Democratic Front is scheduled forearly April.
A unilateral ceasefire will be restored before the round and will be madeeffective only as soon as the respective forces of both sides are duly informed.
Both sides have also agreed to hold the fifth round of formal peacenegotiations in June.
According to Dureza, the agreementwas a result of informal talks held on March 10 and 11 in Utrecht, TheNetherlands.
The unilateral ceasefire is a preludeto an interim bilateral ceasefire that needs further meetings between the twosides to determine and agree on rules, necessary guidelines andmechanisms," he said.
The announcement for the resumption of talks came more than a month afterDuterte ordered the termination of the peace talks that he initiated with therebels. The President has ordered an all-out war against the rebels after hehalted the talks.
According to the Philippine army, the number of rebels dwindled from 26,000 inthe mid-1980s to less than 4,000 this year.-VNA
VNA
