Ramos and rebel share prize

Ramos and rebel share prize

MANILA (AFP): Philippine President Fidel Ramos said yesterday that he was delighted to have jointly won the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) peace prize with a former battlefield adversary.

The Paris-based United Nations agency has named the Filipino leader and Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) founder Nur Misuari as joint winners of the UNESCO-Houphouet Boigny peace award for their efforts at bringing peace to the southern Philippines.

The MNLF signed a peace treaty with Manila in September 1996 to end 24 years of Moslem separatist rebellion in the southern region of Mindanao.

Misuari has since been elected governor of an autonomous region encompassing four mainly Moslem southern provinces.