Separatist pact holds: RP military

Separatist pact holds: RP military

MANILA (AFP): A month-old ceasefire accord is largely intact
in the southern region of Mindanao despite scattered skirmishes
between government troops and Moro separatist rebels, the
Philippine military said on Thursday.

President Gloria Arroyo has sent a senior peace negotiator to
the south to keep alive peace negotiations after clashes there
last weekend left at least 15 Moro Islamic Liberation Front
(MILF) members dead.

Military chief of staff Gen. Diomedio Villanueva said
government forces in Mindanao "have been exercising strict
precautionary measures as stated in the ceasefire agreement,"
signed in Malaysia last month.

"But we have been given the authority to protect the people
and communities from aggression" by the 12,500-member MILF,
Villanueva told reporters. He said based on these parameters, "we
think it's (the truce is) holding."

Arroyo hopes to take advantage of the truce to strike a peace
settlement with the MILF this year, ending the fighting with the
23-year-old movement -- the largest guerrilla army now arrayed
against the Philippines, which is also fighting communist rebels.