Peace Negotiations Watch
Monday, April 25, 2005
(Volume IV, Number 15)
Contents:
Afghanistan
Pakistan,
US, Afghanistan agree to enhance counter-terror cooperation
They also
"welcomed" the establishment of a counter-narcotics working group
Burundi/Rwanda
Regional
leaders extend Burundi's transition, set deadline for election of new
government
The new president will be
sworn into office on Aug. 26
Chechnya
Council
of Europe urges Russia to improve human rights situation
On Chechnya, the report
recommended that Russia push Chechnya's Moscow-backed administration to work
toward reconciliation with separatists
Congo
DR Congo, Rwanda and Uganda agree to end rebel presence in DRC
The DRC argued that Rwanda
had used the presence of the FDLR as an "excuse" for regular forays
into its territory
DR
Congo opens security talks with neighbours
The aim of the meeting is
to discuss the next steps in "neutralising the armed groups" active
mainly in eastern DRC border provinces
Democratic Republic of Congo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the DR
Congo Negotiation Simulation.
Georgia/Abkhazia
Breakaway Georgian region
of Abkhazia holds military exercises; Tbilisi protests
Abkhazia has run its own
affairs since 1993
Indonesia
Prosecutor
drops investigation of Aceh rebel leaders in Sweden
The Free Aceh Movement and
the Indonesian government have been locked in bloody fighting since 1976
Positive
move in Aceh talks
A third round of peace
talks wound up in Helsinki on the weekend
Aceh
Negotiation Simulation
Click
here to access the Aceh
Negotiation Simulation.
Ivory
Coast
Ivory
Coast pullback plan agreed ahead of disarmament talks
Rebels, government and
opposition leaders committed themselves once again to holding elections in October
Ivory
Coast leader visits Libya for talks on peace process
South Africa has been
mediating in the Ivory Coast conflict
Kashmir
Point
of no return?
RARELY have hopes for a
lasting peace between India and Pakistan seemed so bright
India,
Pakistan leaders vow to find "final settlement" to Kashmir dispute
The summit was the latest
in a series of sporadic peace efforts over the past several years
Moderate
Kashmir separatists willing to resume talks with New Delhi
Hardliners broke away from
Hurriyat in 2003 after moderates said they were open to talks with New Delhi
Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation
Click
here to access the Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation
Kosovo
New
Course For Kosovo; Rice Makes Her Presence Felt (Op-Ed)
Significant differences between the first and second
Bush terms continue to emerge
Kosovo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Kosovo
Negotiation Simulation.
Moldova
Council
of Europe calls on Russia and Moldova to comply with court ruling
Ruling to secure the
release of two Moldovan militants jailed in the pro-Russian separatist region
of Transdniestr
Moldovan,
Azerbaijani presidents call on UN to help resolve separatist conflicts
Separatist movements in
Moldova and Azerbaijan have hampered the two countries' development
Morocco
U.N.
Secretary-General asks Security Council to consider bigger mission to Western
Sahara
The
United Nations has tried unsuccessfully to broker a peace agreement for more
than a decade in Western Sahara.
Nepal
Nepal's
king holds first talks with India's PM since power grab
The Nepalese king sacked
the government and suspended civil liberties on February 1
Nepal Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Nepal
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
Philippines
Negotiations
resume, but real peace a long way off in southern Philippines
A stumbling block to the
peace agreement is the MILF's demand over its "ancestral domain"
Philippines
and rebels hail 'breakthrough' in peace talks
A joint statement said
formal peace negotiations were expected to begin within months
Serbia &
Montenegro
EU's
enlargement chief warns Montenegro against independence
EU officials fear that
further border changes in the Balkans could lead to bloodshed
Sri Lanka
U.S.
government asks Sri Lanka, Tamil Tiger rebels to resume peace talks
U.S. administration may
drop the insurgents from a list of terrorist organizations if it
"renounces terrorism by words and deeds."
Hopes
dwindle that tsunami could prove silver lining to Sri Lanka peace
Many feel the opportunity
for a joint deal is the best chance to revive the peace talks
Sri Lanka Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Sri
Lanka Negotiation Simulation
Sudan
Southern
Sudanese representatives back agreement ending Africa's longest war
The leaders recognized
that all sides in the 21-year conflict in southern Sudan had committed
"abuses,"
UN
troops begin arriving in Sudan to enforce peace agreement
More than 40 UN troops
arrived in Sudan
Annan
says Sudan continues attacks in Darfur region despite peace commitments
The government of Sudan is
still battling rebel groups in Sudan's Darfur region despite numerous
agreements to stop the fighting
Afghanistan
Pakistan,
US, Afghanistan agree to enhance counter-terror cooperation
Agence
France Presse, 4/18/2005
The
United States, Pakistan and Afghanistan agreed Monday to strengthen
counter-terrorism cooperation along the Pakistani-Afghan border, the military
here said. Defence officials from the three countries "agreed to further
improve coordination and information sharing to enhance the effectiveness of
counter terrorist operations," it said in a statement following talks in
Islamabad.
They also "welcomed" the establishment of a counter-narcotics working
group to "facilitate discussions" between the three countries, the
military said. Afghanistan produces almost 90 percent of the world's opium and
Pakistan is often used as a transit country to smuggle drugs to the West. Pakistan's
director-general for military operations Major General Mohammad Yousaf, the
commander of US troops in Afghanistan Lieutenant General David W. Barno, and
Afghan national army chief of operations Lieutenant General Sher Mohammad
Karimi led their delegations at the Tripartite Commission meeting.
The commission, formed some three years ago to settle border issues, will meet
again in June 2005 in Kabul, the statement said. The porous and ill-defined
2,400 kilometre (1,488-mile) Pakistan-Afghanistan border has been the source of
enormous friction between the two countries. Afghan officials say key
commanders of the ousted Taliban militia have been allowed to freely cross the
border while conducting guerrilla operations in Afghanistan. Pakistan denies
the charges.
The Taliban were toppled by US-led forces in late 2001 after they refused to
hand over Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, the architect of the September 11,
2001 attacks in the United States.
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Regional
leaders extend Burundi's transition, set deadline for election of new
government
Henry
Wasswa, Associated Press, 4/22/2005
Regional
leaders extended the term of Burundi's transitional government by four months,
and instructed officials in the country to hold elections for a new
administration before Aug. 26. The summit in Uganda also endorsed an election
schedule that was presented by Burundi's electoral officials. Burundians will
vote for local government leaders on June 3. They will also elect members of
the National Assembly on July 4 and Senators on July 19. The new legislators
will then elect a new president on Aug. 19, Burundian Communication Minister
Onisime Nduwimana said in the central African country's capital, Bujumbura.
The new president will be sworn into office on Aug. 26, Uganda's President
Yoweri Museveni said at the end of the emergency summit he hosted. The program
was drafted overnight by members of Burundi's electoral commission. The term of
Burundi's transitional government was set to expire Friday, but officials in
the country had failed to organize the election of successors.
"The main point is that the transition period has been extended and the
elections will be held not later than Aug. 26," Museveni said. Museveni
leads a regional initiative to end a 12-year civil war in Burundi. Regional
leaders are guiding implementation of the 2001 peace deal and a 2003
power-sharing deal between rebels from Burundi's Hutu majority and the former
government that was dominated by members of the Tutsi minority.
The summit communique said the transition period had been extended until Aug.
26 "in line with the agreed elections calendar." "The heads of
state welcomed the commitment by the transitional government that this calendar
will be strictly adhered to," according to the statement. The United
Nations is ready to support the electoral process, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi
Annan said in a statement read by his representative in Burundi, Carolyn
McAskie.
"I now call on all Burundi's leaders to take that last step toward meeting
the aspirations of the Burundian people, who deserve nothing less than a
democratically elected government, committed to peace, stability and
development," Annan said. "As long as the Burundian parties continue
to demonstrate the necessary political will, I'm confident that a credible
electoral exercise can be completed within the short time remaining."
Museveni, Burundi's President Domitien Ndayizeye, Tanzania's Benjamin Mkapa,
Zambia's Levy Mwanawasa, Kenya's Mwai Kibaki, South African Vice President
Jacob Zuma, Rwanda's Prime Minister Bernard Makuza and a Cabinet minister from
Ethiopia attended the meeting. As part of other efforts to restore calm in
Burundi, some 6,000 combatants from six former rebel groups began joining
police units on Thursday after graduating from U.N. training, the Burundian
police chief of staff, Brig. Gen. Alain Bunyoni, said Friday. The integration
was agreed to under the peace deal and a 2003 power-sharing agreement.
By July, some 14,000 members of the current Public Security Police and Border
and Air Police units as well as the paramilitary gendarmerie will be integrated
with former rebels into the new Burundi National Police force, Bunyoni told The
Associated Press. More than 250,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed
in Burundi's conflict. A new government was formed in 2003 after the
power-sharing deal was struck with the largest Hutu rebel group.
On April 13, the last holdout rebel group, the National Liberation Force,
agreed to stop fighting once peace talks begin with the government. Since
Christmas, the group has been pressing regional leaders, Burundi's government
and the United Nations to open talks to end the conflict. Associated Press
writer Aloys Niyoyita in Bujumbura, Burundi, contributed to this report.
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Council
of Europe urges Russia to improve human rights situation
Associated
Press, 4/20/2005
Europe's
top human rights watchdog on Wednesday urged Russia to abolish the death
penalty, combat police violence and safeguard minority rights, particularly in
Chechnya. The Council of Europe also called on Moscow to improve prison
conditions, to guarantee full freedom of expression and to strengthen the
independence of the judiciary.
"The abolition of the death penalty is essential to the establishment of a
genuine modern democracy which fully respects fundamental freedoms and
rights," Commissioner Alvaro Gil-Robles said in his report on the state of
human rights in Russia. "I call on the highest authorities of Russia to
pass a law abolishing capital punishment, not only in practice, as is currently
the case, but also in law."
Russia imposed a moratorium on the death penalty in 1996, fulfilling one of the
main conditions to becoming a Council of Europe member state. However, many
Russians support capital punishment, and earlier this year, Russian Deputy
Prosecutor General Vladimir Kolesnikov proposed lifting the moratorium for
those convicted of organizing and carrying out terrorist acts.
"(These arguments are) a source of grave concern, particularly as many
such voices have been raised over the last few years in the highest echelons of
power in the Duma, the lower house of Parliament," Gil-Robles said. The
report, which praises Russia for the transformation it has undergone over the
past 15 years but points out problems with implementing reforms, also urged
authorities to renovate and modernize hospitals and to grant all citizens
access to health care.
On Chechnya, the report recommended that Russia push Chechnya's Moscow-backed
administration to work toward reconciliation with separatists in the breakaway
southern republic. Tens of thousands of Chechens have fled because of fighting
between Russian forces and Chechen rebels. "There has to be an atmosphere
of security permitting the return of refugees," the report said. "A
political dialogue within Chechen society must begin in order to rebuild civil
society, and material living conditions must be improved, which requires the
economic and civil reconstruction of Chechnya.
"The town of Grozny, totally in ruins, shows the urgent need for
reconstruction; this state of decay and dereliction is another punishment
unjustly inflicted on the Chechen population," the report concluded.
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DR Congo, Rwanda and Uganda agree to end rebel presence in DRC
Agence
France Presse, 4/22/2005
The
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda and Uganda have agreed to put an end
to the presence of armed groups in the DRC that pose a threat to all of them,
the DRC government announced Friday. After a two-day meeting in Lubumbashi, the
main city in the southeastern Katanga province of the DRC, "the three
countries reaffirmed their commitment to put an end to the threat posed to the
security of the three countries by the presence and activities of the negative
forces in the east," a statement said.
In the framework of a 2004 tripartite agreement aimed at restoring peace in the
Great Lakes are "they agreed to put into effect a US-sponsored mechanism
for exchanging information, to establish confidence between the countries and
deal with the problem of armed groups in the east of the DRC." Although the statement referred to
"negative forces " the only group to be mentioned by name in the
statement were rebel Rwandan Hutus belonging to the Democratic Forces for the
Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).
After hiding in the jungles of the east of the DRC for the past 11 years, on
March 31 the FDLR announced in Rome they were giving up their armed struggle
and agreeing to go back to Rwanda. Their presence has soured relations between
the DRC and Rwanda for a decade, with Kigali charging that the rebels took an
active part in the genocide of an estimated 800,000 minority Tutsis and
moderate Hutus in 1994.
The DRC argued that Rwanda had used the presence of the FDLR as an
"excuse" for regular forays into its territory. Referring to the Rome
statement, the three parties, backed by the observers present (the African
Union, Belgium, Britain, European Union and United Nations), "agreed to
make use of the tripartite process to back the joint efforts of the UN Mission
in the DRC (MONUC) and the DRC to disarm, demobilise and repatriate FDLR
members to Rwanda."
"The Rwandan government praised the efforts of the DRC (to encourage
repatriation) and repeated its commitment to receive the members of the FDLR
and their families," the statement said. Rwanda's deputy foreign minister,
Protais Mitali, agreed that there was a commitment "to work in close
collaboration. We've got a long way on our side. We have a scheme to welcome
back the ex-Interhamwe (militia) who will soon retun to Rwanda."
The statement made no mention of the presence in the DRC of Ugandan rebels
belonging to the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), although Kampala has recently
attacked their presence in eastern DRC. But MONUC said there was no recent proof
of any such presence. Speaking on the sidelines of the meeting DRC Foreign
Minister Raymond Ramazani Baya emphasised the need to put in place
"structures for combined verification" of these
"allegations".
"We've agreed that each country should monitor its border to prevent arms
trafficking and infiltration by armed groups," the minister said. The
three countries will meet again in Kigali in August. Between 1998 and 2003 DRC
was the theatre of a war that involved half a dozen states in the region, including
Rwanda and Uganda. The conflict is estimated to have cost three million lives
directly or indirectly.
DR
Congo opens security talks with neighbours
Agence
France Presse, 4/21/2005
Ministers
from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and its neighbours Rwanda and
Uganda began talks on security questions Thursday with UN and US
representatives present. The fourth round of planned two-day talks came as
Rwanda is under pressure to accept peace moves from a rebel group based in the
DRC and Uganda is defending itself in the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
against accusations from Kinshasa.
The aim of the meeting, which organisers said may now last into Saturday, is to
discuss the next steps in "neutralising the armed groups" active
mainly in eastern DRC border provinces by disarming them and repatriating many
of the fighters, in line with an accord signed some six months ago. The DRC was represented Thursday by Foreign
Minister Raymond Ramazani Baya, Rwanda by Deputy Foreign Minister Protais
Mitali and Uganda by Communications Minister Tom Butime.
In October 2004, the three countries signed a pact in which they committed
themselves to working together in a joint defence and security commission. The
accord is actively backed by thousands of UN troops deployed in post-war DRC
and working alongside Kinshasa's government soldiers to get the guns off the
militias and persuade them to engage in voluntary rehabilitation.
The presence in the DRC of Rwandan Hutu former troops and militias held
responsible for the 1994 genocide and their families, relatives and sometimes
coerced civilians has been a major source of regional instability. Politically,
these people are represented by the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of
Rwanda (FDLR) movement, which on March 31 announced in Rome that it had decided
to end armed struggle.
Tensions have been further heightened by the activities of around a dozen
mainly ethnic militias in northeastern DRC fighting small wars of their own and
driving scores of thousands of locals from their homes. The meeting at
Lumumbashi, in the southeast DRC, was also attended by UN representative
William Lacy Swing and US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African
Affairs Donald Yamamoto.
When one of the militias in the volatile Ituri province next to Uganda in late
February ambushed and butchered nine UN Bangladeshi peacekeepers on patrol, the
UN mission in the DRC, MONUC, opted for a tough military response on March 1
and has since carried out seek and disarm operations with armoured vehicles
backed by airpower.
When they meet resistance, they exercise a mandate to shoot back in
self-defence. A UN report published early in February accused Rwanda and
Uganda, which both backed DRC rebel movements in a 1998-2003 war that engulfed
the country, of violating an arms embargo, which the United Nations on Monday
extended to the whole DRC, as well as the east.
Both parties have denied the allegations, but the tensions poison relations. The
last joint security meeting, aimed at securing peace across the central and
east African Great Lakes region, took place in Washington in February. Burundi,
emerging from a civil war of its own, the African Union and the European Union
were represented at the Lubumbashi talks in an observer capacity.
During the last war that wracked the huge central African DRC from 1998 to
2003, Rwandan and Ugandan troops were among the armies of half a dozen African
countries to intervene directly on one side or the other.
Democratic Republic of Congo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the DR
Congo Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
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Breakaway Georgian region
of Abkhazia holds military exercises; Tbilisi protests
Associated Press, 4/18/2005
Georgia's
breakaway region of Abkhazia on Monday began military exercises it said were
intended to boost the province's combat-readiness - maneuvers being nervously
watched by Tbilisi which is eager to return the restive region into the fold. The
three-day maneuvers will involve 3,000 troops from infantry, marine and other
branches, Abkhazia's military chief Anatoly Zaitsev said.
Abkhazia has run its own affairs since 1993, when separatists drove out
Georgian government troops, and the regional government has cultivated close
ties with Russia. Georgian officials, meanwhile, voiced their displeasure with
the maneuvers and accused Moscow of being behind them. "These exercises
are some kind of an attempt to demonstrate force," Minister for Conflict
Resolution Georgy Khaindrava told The Associated Press. "They are
basically run by former senior military officers who are Russian citizens."
Since Abkhazia had not been recognized by the international community,
Khaindrava said, it cannot have armed forces of its own and he called its
military units "illegal armed groups." Tbilisi still hopes to find a
way out of the long-standing conflict, he said. "I still would like to
hope that common sense will prevail and that negotiations will take place amid
mutual understanding," Khaindrava said.
Since coming to power in 2004, President Mikhail Saakashvili has vowed to bring
Abkhazia and another renegade region - South Ossetia - back under federal
control, but negotiations have been tense and arduous. The Black Sea region has
had de-facto independence since breaking away from Georgia, but it is not
recognized internationally. Saakashvili's offers of broad autonomy for the
region have been rejected.
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Prosecutor
drops investigation of Aceh rebel leaders in Sweden
Mattias
Karen, Associated Press, 4/22/2005
A
Swedish prosecutor on Friday dropped an investigation of two exiled Aceh rebel
leaders, saying there is no evidence they helped plan terrorist attacks in
Indonesia. Malik Mahmud and Zaini Abdullah, leaders of the Free Aceh Movement,
are accused by Indonesia of staging assassinations, arsons, bombings and
kidnappings.
However, prosecutor Tomas Lindstrand said "it cannot be proven that Mahmud
or Abdullah planned, ordered or in any way acted as accessories to the criminal
acts" listed by Indonesia. "This
is the happiest news I've ever heard," rebel spokesman Bakhtiar Abdullah
told The Associated Press when informed of the decision. "This shows that
we're innocent, and that we're an organization that can keep our credibility as
a liberation movement."
The Free Aceh Movement and the Indonesian government have been locked in bloody
fighting since 1976. They were brought closer by the Dec. 26 tsunami that
devastated the Aceh province, and have met in Helsinki, Finland, for three
rounds of peace talks this spring. A fourth round of talks is scheduled for
May. Abdullah said Friday's decision means that the rebels can "can now
focus completely on the peace process."
"It's very encouraging that we can now seek a peaceful solution that is
dignified for both parts," he said. Lindstrand's decision follows a
two-year investigation into whether the rebel leaders, who have been living in
exile in Sweden since the late 1970s, were behind a September 2000 blast at the
Jakarta Stock Exchange that killed 15 people, as well as several other
bombings, two assassinations, six arson attacks at schools and 243 kidnappings.
The Free Aceh Movement has denied the accusations, saying its actions are
confined to the province of 4.1 million people on the northern tip of Sumatra
Island. Lindstrand, who traveled to Indonesia last year to interrogate other
rebels, said that "local commanders most often act on their own initiative
while the leadership lays down general outlines."
In July, Lindstrand dismissed the aging Hasan di Tiro from the investigation,
saying the 80-year-old former rebel leader no longer controls the group because
of an illness. All three men are Swedish citizens and cannot be extradited. The
Acehnese have been fighting for independence on-and-off since the 1870s, when
their homeland was invaded by Dutch troops and incorporated into their East
Indies colony, which in 1945 gained independence as Indonesia. The latest round
of fighting began in 1976. More than 12,000 people have died in the province in
the past decade.
Positive
move in Aceh talks
Sian
Powell, The Australian, 4/18/2005
THE
Indonesian Government and Aceh's separatist rebels appear to be inching towards
a peace agreement for the tsunami-devastated province that has been torn by
conflict for almost 30 years. A third round of peace talks wound up in Helsinki
on the weekend with both sides agreeing to further talks late next month. Chief
mediator and former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari said the talks had been
held in "a positive and constructive atmosphere", with Jakarta and
the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) agreeing to continue working towards "a
permanent and comprehensive solution with dignity for all".
Given impetus by the tsunami, which killed as many as 164,000 Acehnese and
wrecked the homes of hundreds of thousands more, the peace talks had reached
the point of discussing external monitoring and security arrangements. But GAM
was insisting on "self-government" and Jakarta was talking about
"special autonomy".
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono made it clear on Friday that Aceh
would never be given even limited independence. "The unitary state of the
Indonesian republic must be maintained and the red and white flag (of
Indonesia) must fly (in Aceh)," Dr Yudhoyono said in a speech to
government security advisers.
Meanwhile, violence continues in stricken Aceh, where more than 12,000 people
have been killed over the years in battles between the rebels and the
Indonesian military. A spokesman for the armed forces said last week three
extra battalions would be sent to Aceh to reinforce more than 40,000 troops
stationed there. The military last week turned down an offer of a ceasefire,
and sporadic firefights continued on the ground.
On Saturday the Indonesian military, which has conceded it has killed more than
260 rebels since the Boxing Day earthquake and tsunami, said it had seized a
large cache of ammunition and shot dead a rebel leader in the Aceh Besar
district. Nevertheless, the talks in Helsinki appear to have been progressing
well, finishing a day ahead of schedule.
The discussions are the first formal negotiations since Jakarta launched a
military offensive against the rebels in May 2003, after the failure of another
international peace initiative. Analysts warn the Helsinki talks could still be
easily derailed by fundamental disagreements on details. A GAM military
spokesman in Aceh, Sofyan Dawood, reacted furiously recently when Finnish
mediation organisation Crisis Management Initiative put a notice on its website
saying the rebels had agreed to discuss special autonomy.
Despite the province's gas and oil reserves, Aceh's people remain fundamentally
poor, and a peace agreement is urgently needed to smooth the way for aid and
development projects. A recent Unicef
survey found 11.6 per cent of homeless children in Aceh were malnourished,
suggesting the conflict had wrought long-term damage.
Aceh
Negotiation Simulation
Click
here to access the Aceh
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
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Ivory
Coast pullback plan agreed ahead of disarmament talks
Dino
Mahtani, Financial Times, 4/18/2005
Ivory
Coast army chiefs and rebel leaders this weekend agreed to start pulling back
heavy weapons from front lines this week, following a peace accord reached in
Pretoria, South Africa, earlier this month. The country has been split in two
since 2002, when rebels failed to oust President Laurent Gbagbo but seized the
northern half of the country.
About 10,000 UN and French peacekeepers have been deployed in the country. The
agreement will give both sides time to consider a final disarmament plan,
scheduled to begin in May. However, several disarmament plans have already
failed and no weapons have been handed in. Clashes between rebels and
pro-government militia in the west of the country earlier this year sparked
fears of a return to war in the world's top cocoa producer and former French
colony, once seen as a bastion of stability in an otherwise troubled region.
But in a deal brokered earlier this month by Thabo Mbeki, South Africa's
president, rebels, government and opposition leaders committed themselves once
again to holding elections in October. Rebel ministers have since rejoined the
government. Mr Mbeki has recommended that the country's main opposition leader,
Alassane Ouattara, should be eligible to contest the polls. The Ivorian courts
had barred Mr Ouattara from contesting the 2000 elections, saying both his
parents were not Ivorian.
Rebels insist that Mr Ouattara should be able to run for president. Mr Gbagbo
has said that decision can be taken only after a referendum, which would in
turn only be possible if rebels disarm. He has not made clear whether he has
accepted Mr Mbeki's recommendation. Diplomats fear that Mr Gbagbo's supporters
could take to the streets in their thousands if the recommendation is accepted.
Ivory
Coast leader visits Libya for talks on peace process
Agence
France Presse, 4/24/2005
President
Laurent Gbagbo of Ivory Coast has made a visit to Libya as part of
consultations to end the armed stand-off in his divided west Africa country, a
spokesman for Gbagbo said on Sunday. The Ivory Coast leader, whose government
is involved in a peace process to end a two-and-a-half-year-old rebellion in
the north, travelled to Tripoli on Saturday and was expected home later on
Sunday, said spokesman Silvere Nebout.
In the Libyan capital, Gbagbo met with Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, he said. Last
November Kadhafi criticized the role played by Ivory Coast's former coloniser,
France, in the conflict. France has 4,000 troops in the country, and their
deployment along the line separating government-controlled land in the south
from rebel-held areas in the north, plus their actions during demonstrations in
the main city of Abidjan last year, have angered Gbagbo's government.
South Africa has been mediating in the Ivory Coast conflict, and Gbagbo is due
to make a speech to the nation next Wednesday to give his views on peace
proposals made by South African President Thabo Mbeki. Mbeki has notably
demanded that a key opposition leader from the north, Alassane Ouattara, be
allowed to run in presidential elections, which are due in October this year.
Ouattara, who once served as Ivory Coast's prime minister, was excluded from
earlier elections on the grounds that it was not clear whether he was eligible
under a controversial nationality rule.
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Point
of no return?
The
Economist, 4/21/2005
Watching
cricket, talking peace
RARELY have hopes for a lasting peace between India and Pakistan seemed so
bright. Pakistan's president, General Pervez Musharraf, this week paid his
first visit to India since a disastrous summit in 2001. This time, an
international cricket match gave the excuse for an "informal" visit
that nevertheless bore all the trappings of a summit. It achieved no great
breakthrough but, if General Musharraf and India's prime minister, Manmohan
Singh, are right, managed something even better: to show that "the peace
process was now irreversible".
It is not, of course. As General Musharraf himself pointed out, in the absence
of a "final settlement", the dispute over which the two countries have
fought three wars, Kashmir, could erupt again at any time. For the time being,
however, both countries are preoccupied not with the risk of renewed conflict,
but with the potential benefits of peace.
The co-operative mood had been set by the opening, on April 7th, of a bus route
between Srinagar, capital of Indian-held Kashmir, and Muzaffarabad, capital of
the Pakistani part, for the first time since partition in 1947. Pakistan joined
India in condemning an attack on some of the buses' passengers on the eve of
their departure from Srinagar. The service brought the hope of reunion to
separated Kashmiri families, but also had huge symbolic importance. It showed
that both countries were prepared to compromise on long-held positions:
Pakistan on its objection to an arrangement that might be seen as turning the
"line of control" that divides Kashmir into an international border;
India on its original insistence that passengers would have to carry passports.
In Delhi, General Musharraf and Mr Singh agreed to increase the frequency of
the buses, which initially will travel only once a fortnight. They also agreed
to let goods lorries ply the route, to open others and to agree meeting points
along the line of control for divided families and trade. The hope is that a
"soft border" will both improve the lives of Kashmiris on either side
and bring a final settlement closer. Beyond Kashmir, there were moves designed
to promote bilateral trade, such as reactivating a moribund joint economic
commission. A dispute over a dam being built in Indian Kashmir-the trickiest
bilateral economic issue of the moment-was simply ignored in the leaders' joint
statement.
All of this fits in with a strategy pursued by India since Mr Singh's
predecessor, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, whom General Musharraf also visited, offered
Pakistan "the hand of friendship" two years ago. It has sought to
build confidence through increasing contacts, expanding economic ties, and
taking advantage of the popularity in both countries of moves towards peace.
In doing so, it has had to counter the suspicions of many in Pakistan and
Kashmir that India was seeking to enmesh Pakistan in a spider's web of minor
accords without ever tackling the central dispute: Kashmir. Both countries
claim all of the territory, though India has long let it be known that it would
settle for the status quo. Many in Kashmir itself, however, yearn for
independence from both countries. For 15 years, the Indian part has suffered a
bloody insurgency, abetted by Pakistan.
In Delhi, General Musharraf met separatist leaders from Indian-held Kashmir.
Moderates among them have welcomed recent peace moves, while bemoaning the lack
of a Kashmiri seat at the negotiating table. But hardliners accused General
Musharraf of betrayal. No longer, as they would like, and as Pakistan used to
argue, is a settlement of the dispute seen as a precondition to improved
relations. Rather, it is hoped that, in a benign bilateral climate, a solution
might emerge.
That still looks a tall order. General Musharraf argued that the route to a
settlement would have to stay within three guidelines: India's insistence that
no boundaries can be redrawn; Pakistan's refusal to accept the line of control;
and the two countries' agreement that borders must become less important. But
the first two of these are mutually incompatible; and the flexibility and
vagueness needed to blur the contradiction seem at odds with General
Musharraf's insistence that there must be a "final settlement".
Yet the two leaders have agreed that they will not "allow terrorism to
impede the peace process". That is a striking promise, implying both that
Pakistan is distancing itself further from "freedom fighters" in
Kashmir, and that India is not going to react to every terrorist attack as if
it were an act of Pakistani aggression. True peace may be a long way off, but
the threat of war is no longer just one atrocity away.
India,
Pakistan leaders vow to find "final settlement" to Kashmir dispute
Rajesh
Mahapatra, Associated Press, 4/18/2005
India
and Pakistan will reach a "final settlement" to the decades-old
dispute over Kashmir, their leaders vowed Monday, concluding three days of
talks with a series of agreements to boost trade and cross-border travel. With
Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf beside him, Indian Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh announced the two had agreed to continue talks on Kashmir in
"a sincere and purposeful and forward-looking manner for a final
settlement."
Although there was little sign of an impending breakthrough on the divided
Himalayan region, both sides made significant progress in pushing a strategy
that seeks to downplay their competing territorial claims to Kashmir - and
emphasizes creating goodwill among the Kashmiri people. Reading from a joint statement, Singh said the
two leaders "determined that the peace process was now irreversible."
They agreed to increase the frequency of a cross-Kashmir bus service that
started earlier this month and open more meeting points and travel routes for
divided families along the Line of Control, the de facto border that splits the
region between the nuclear-armed rivals. These, coupled with other decisions
aimed at boosting bilateral ties, are expected to help find an enduring
solution to the Kashmir issue, which has been at the heart of more than a
half-century of rivalry between India and Pakistan.
The leaders' meetings were squeezed around a Sunday cricket match between India
and Pakistan - the original reason Musharraf was scheduled to make the trip. Musharraf
said the talks were more successful than he had expected, but that a final
solution to the Kashmir dispute will take "time and wisdom." The
Indian prime minister, who also appeared upbeat, indicated New Delhi was
willing to make more concessions to Pakistan on trade. Singh also accepted
Musharraf's invitation to visit Pakistan.
The summit was the latest in a series of sporadic peace efforts over the past
several years that have frequently fallen victim to violence by Islamic
militants. Since January last year, though, the peace talks have moved ahead
largely uninterrupted - though often unsteadily. More than a dozen Islamic
militant groups are fighting in Indian-controlled Kashmir for the region's
independence or for its merger with mostly Muslim Pakistan. The 15-year insurgency
has claimed more than 66,000 lives.
On Monday, the rebels accused Musharraf of abandoning the cause of the Kashmiri
people. "Musharraf has sold out Kashmir for trade and tourism, ... knelt
before India," said a joint statement by four rebel groups in India's
portion Kashmir. "We will not give up the holy war, Jihad, until Kashmir
becomes free," said faxed statement, whose authenticity could not be
verified.
The criticism was echoed by a militant group in Pakistani Kashmir. Musharraf's
last visit four years ago for a summit with then-Prime Minister Atal Bihari
Vajpayee failed to reach any agreements, as both sides remained rigid on
Kashmir, over which they have fought two of their three wars since winning
independence in 1947. This time, Musharraf said, "the strategy of a
coercive diplomacy is no more an option."
Moderate
Kashmir separatists willing to resume talks with New Delhi
Agence
France Presse, 4/19/2005
Indian
Kashmir's moderate separatists said Tuesday they were willing to resume talks
with New Delhi to end the long-running dispute over the restive region's
future. But hardliners said they were still holding out for trilateral talks
involving India, Pakistan and Kashmiris to end the row over Kashmir, the cause
of two of three wars between the nuclear-armed South Asian neighbours.
"We're willing to resume talks with New Delhi," Mirwaiz Umar Farooq,
head of the moderate wing of Indian Kashmir's main separatist alliance,
Hurriyat, said in the Indian zone's main city, Srinagar. "But later we should be allowed to visit
Pakistan... to push the peace process forward," he said. "We want to
talk to militant leaders there and also with political leadership in
Pakistan-administered Kashmir."
Farooq and his supporters and separatist hardliner Syed Ali Geelani and his
backers met Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf separately in New Delhi during
a three-day visit to India that ended Monday. Both countries declared their
14-month peace process "irreversible" and pledged to reach a
"final settlement" on Kashmir.
Musharraf said in a broadcast by Pakistan TV late Monday that Indian Kashmir
separatist leaders should use "their brains" and join talks with
India as it would be a step toward trilateral talks, The Press Trust of India
reported. Geelani said Musharraf had urged the two factions to speak with one
voice to New Delhi. "Pakistan
desires separatist unity," Geelani told Kashmir's Current News Service.
"But I can't break my principles to forge unity for the sake of
unity."
Hardliners broke away from Hurriyat in 2003 after moderates said they were open
to talks with New Delhi. Both factions claim to be the real Hurriyat. Farooq
said Musharraf appreciated his "step-by step approach" towards
resolving the issue of divided Kashmir, where Islamic rebels in the Indian zone
have been fighting since 1989 to make it part of Pakistan or independent.
His tone contrasted sharply with Geelani's who blasted Monday the joint
statement by India and Pakistan. Geelani said the statement contained no
concrete proposals to resolve the Kashmir issue and failed to "provide any
sort of relief to suffering Kashmiris" who he charged were "facing
the worst kind of state terrorism" in the heavily militarised state.
India and Pakistan started the peace process 14 months ago. It has resulted in
a ceasefire along their disputed Kashmir boundary and a bus service linking the
two zones of the divided region.
Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation
Click
here to access the Kashmir
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
Return to Index
New
Course For Kosovo; Rice Makes Her Presence Felt (Op-Ed)
Richard
Holbrooke, Washington Post, 4/20/2005
Significant
differences between the first and second Bush terms continue to emerge. After
studied silence in her White House years, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
is beginning to reveal her style and values, clearly with presidential
approval. She seems to be a pragmatic conservative, oriented toward
problem-solving, pursuing essentially non-ideological policies. She is careful
(and politically smart) to keep faith, in all her statements, with
neoconservative values, but she is also finding high-profile, low-cost ways,
such as extensive travel, to improve America's shaky image and relationships
around the world. Several recent events are worth attention:
* The dramatic policy reversal -- personally shaped by President Bush --
resulting in a decision not to veto a U.N. Security Council resolution
authorizing a role for the International Criminal Court in Darfur. This was the
first time in four years that the Bush administration had departed from its
practice of opposing anything having to do with the ICC.
* Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick's well-orchestrated trip to Sudan,
following the U.N. vote, to hammer the Khartoum government on Darfur. Zoellick
became the first U.S. official to embrace the suggestion of several people,
including U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton
and Jon Corzine, that NATO could play a role in support of an African Union
peacekeeping force. (Next: Appoint a high-level special envoy for Darfur and a
separate, full-time ambassador accredited to the African Union.)
* The appointment of outgoing World Bank president James Wolfensohn to the new
post of special coordinator for development of Gaza -- an inspired choice,
given Wolfensohn's reputation in this field; also a rather bold one for an
administration that has famously subjected its appointees to a political litmus
test that the liberal Wolfensohn, a Bill Clinton appointee, could never have
passed.
One notable policy change has gone virtually unnoticed -- the one concerning
Kosovo, where, after four years of neglect and mistakes, the administration has
made a major shift. Ever since the 78-day NATO bombing campaign freed the
Kosovar Albanians from Slobodan Milosevic's oppressive grip in 1999, political
control of Kosovo has been in the semi-competent hands of the United Nations,
while NATO has maintained a fragile peace between the majority Albanian and
minority Serb populations.
Under Security Council Resolution 1244, passed in 1999, the final status of
Kosovo was supposed to be worked out through negotiations that would result in
either independence, partition or a return by Kosovo to its former status as
part of a country once known as Yugoslavia, now "Serbia and
Montenegro." But instead of starting this process years ago, Washington
and the European Union fashioned a delaying policy they called "standards
before status," a phrase that disguised bureaucratic inaction inside
diplomatic
umbo-jumbo.
As a result, there have been no serious discussions on the future of Kosovo for
the past four years, even as windows of opportunity closed and Albanian-Serb
tensions rose. Finally, bloody rioting erupted last March, leaving eight Serbs
and 11 Albanians dead, a thousand people injured and the region teetering on
the brink of another war. Tensions have remained high ever since; just two days
ago there was a bomb attack on the offices of an opposition party in Kosovo.
Last month, after warnings about the explosiveness of the situation from Philip
Goldberg, America's senior diplomat there, Rice sent Undersecretary of State
Nicholas Burns to Europe for meetings with the nearly moribund Contact Group
(the United States, Britain, France, Italy, Russia and Germany). Burns told
them that the situation in Kosovo was inherently unstable and, unless there was
an acceleration of efforts to determine its final status, violence would
probably increase, with NATO forces, including U.S. troops, tied down
indefinitely.
Under American pressure -- always the necessary ingredient in dealing with the
sluggish, process-driven European Union -- a new Contact Group policy has begun
to emerge. This summer a special U.N. representative will "determine"
that Kosovo has met the necessary standards -- self-governance, refugees,
returnees, freedom of movement, etc. -- and is therefore ready for status
talks. (Of course, this should have been done years ago, but better late than
never.) Then will come the really tough part: What should Kosovo's final status
be? Separate nation, Serb province, partition?
Although no one is talking on the record in Washington or in Europe, I find it
hard to see any ultimate outcome for Kosovo other than independence, perhaps on
a staged basis over the next several years. But such an outcome requires strong
guarantees for the endangered Serb minority that remains in Kosovo -- between
100,000 and 200,000 people. The protection of Kosovo's Serbs will require some
sort of continued international security presence. In addition, the deeply
divided Kosovar Albanians, whose last prime minister is now facing war crimes
charges in The Hague, must achieve a much higher level of political maturity.
Ultimately, Belgrade will have to accept something politically difficult:
giving up Serbian claims to Kosovo, which Serbs regard as their historic
heartland. The Serbs will have to choose between trying to join the European
Union and trying to regain Kosovo. If they seek their lost province, they will
end up with neither. But, if it can opt for the future over the past, Serbia
would have a bright future as an E.U. member, and the ancient dream of an
economically integrated, peaceful Southeast Europe (including Greece and
Bosnia) would be within reach. The European Union, however, must make a real
deal on Kosovo an integral part of the membership process for Serbia.
There are many complicated subplots here, involving Montenegro, Bosnia,
Albania, the United Nations, the E.U. and NATO. But for now the important thing
is that after ignoring the issue for four years, the administration is doing
something in the Balkans, where nothing happens without U.S. leadership. Given
that instability in the Balkans -- and Kosovo is highly unstable now -- has
historically spread into other parts of Europe, and that the region lies in the
heart of the growing NATO sphere, this is the sort of problem that must be
addressed before it grows again into a major crisis.
Richard Holbrooke, a presidential envoy for Bosnia and Kosovo during the
Clinton administration, writes a monthly column for The Post.
Kosovo Negotiation Simulation
Click here to access the Kosovo
Negotiation Simulation prepared by the Public International Law &
Policy Group.
Return to Index
Albanian,
Macedonian presidents to meet on bilateral ties, EU and NATO integration
efforts
Associated
Press, 4/19/2005
The
presidents of Albania and Macedonia will meet to discuss bilateral relations
and joint efforts toward integration into the European Union and NATO, the
Albanian president's office said Tuesday.
Albanian President Alfred Moisiu and his Macedonian counterpart, Branko
Crvenkovski, are to meet Wednesday in the Macedonian border town of St. Naum,
about 140 kilometers (87 miles) east of Tirana. The town is on the shores of
Ohrid Lake where Macedonian leaders signed a peace deal in 2001 to end six
months of clashes between Macedonian troops and ethnic Albanian rebels.
Return to Index
Moldova
Council of Europe calls on Russia and Moldova to
comply with court ruling
Agence France Presse, 4/22/2005
The Council of Europe called Friday on Russia and
Moldova to comply with an order from the European Court of Human Rights to
secure the release of two Moldovan militants jailed in the pro-Russian
separatist region of Transdniestr. The pan-European organisation's committee of
ministers said both Moscow and Chisinau should act to free Andrei Ivantoc and
Tudor Petrov-Popa, who were sentenced to 15 years' jail in 1993.
Two other men, Romanian nationalist parliamentarian Ilie Ilascu, and Alexandru
Lesco, were also given jail terms but were released in 2001 and 2004
respectively. All four were in
Transdniestr in a bid to keep the Russian-speaking region from breaking off
from Moldova. Some of those who arrested them in 1992 wore the uniforms of
Soviet Russia's 14th Army, which still garrisons the region.
The directive of the European Court of Human Rights in July 2004 was given a
frosty reception by Moscow, which said it viewed the court's ruling on its role
in the imprisonment of the plaintiffs with "bewilderment." The
break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991 saw tiny Moldova win independence and hear
calls from its largely ethnic Romanian population for reunification with Romania
and a full break with Russia.
Meanwhile Moldova's eastern Russian-speaking region of Transdniestr -- on
Ukraine's border -- sought to keep ties with Moscow and was home to Russia's
14th army. A civil war broke out in Moldova in 1992. Considered a hero by
Moldova's Romanian-speaking majority and Romanians themselves, Ilascu
complained to the European court against both Russia and Moldova for a series
of alleged human rights violations.
Both Russia and Moldova denied the charges. The committee of ministers Friday
welcomed the fact that both Moscow and Chisinau had paid financial damages
ordered by the court to the applicants, but said the steps taken to secure the
release of Ivantoc and Petrov-Popa were not sufficient. The ministers said they
would continue to examine the case at each of their meetings until the
applicants release.
Moldovan, Azerbaijani presidents call on UN to help
resolve separatist conflicts
Corneliu Rusnac, Associated Press, 4/21/2005
The presidents of Moldova and Azerbaijan called
Thursday on the United Nations to discuss separatist conflicts in the two
ex-Soviet countries. "We are countries who have suffered from aggressive
separatism," said Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliev, who met with his
Moldovan counterpart, Vladimir Voronin, during a visit to the Moldovan capital,
Chisinau.
Separatist movements in Moldova and Azerbaijan have hampered the two countries'
development since they became independent in 1991. Facing similar problems, the
countries' leaders vowed to collaborate in resolving their conflicts. Increased involvement by the international
community would also help, though, Aliev said.
"The truth and the international laws are on our side," Aliev said. The
two presidents also pledged to boost economic ties and to collaborate on their
countries' European integration. Aliev was in Chisinau to take part in a
meeting of a regional organization known as GUUAM, which groups the ex-Soviet
countries of Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova.
The group was established in 1997 in a bid to seek economic cooperation outside
the influence of Russia. The summit on Friday will also be attended by
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko and Georgia's President Mikhail
Saakashvili. Romania's President Traian Basescu and the president of Lithuania,
Valdas Adamkus, will also participate as observers.
Moldova has struggled for years to reach a settlement with its separatists in
the eastern, Russian-speaking province of Trans-Dniester. A brief war in 1992
left more than 1,500 people dead. Trans-Dniester is not recognized
internationally, but receives support from Russia, which has troops in the
province. Azerbaijan has faced ethic strife in Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous
region that has been under the control of ethnic Armenians since the early
1990s, following fighting that killed an estimated 30,000 people. A cease-fire
was signed in 1994, but the enclave's final political status has not been
determined and shooting breaks out frequently across a demilitarized buffer
zone.
Return to Index
U.N.
Secretary-General asks Security Council to consider bigger mission to Western
Sahara
Associated
Press, 4/22/2005
UNITED
NATIONS (AP)- Tens of thousands of Saharan refugees are still living in
"deplorable conditions" because of the long-standing political
deadlock in Western Sahara, according to a new report from U.N.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan. The United Nations has tried unsuccessfully to
broker a peace agreement for more than a decade in Western Sahara.
Western Sahara's Spanish colonizers left the territory in 1975, and Morocco and
Mauritania split it. War broke out the following year, and Morocco took over
the whole of Western Sahara after Mauritania pulled out in 1979. Kofi Annan
told the Security Council Thursday that although there had been an increase in
high-level contacts in the region there had been little movement on a proposed
peace plan for self-determination.
The Security Council had asked Annan to look at ways of scaling back the U.N.
mission, but he said its mandate should be extended for another six months and
consideration given to bolstering its numbers in order to monitor the
cease-fire. Annan called on the Frente Polisario, which continues to hold
Moroccan prisoners of war, to release all prisoners without any further delay.
The fighting, which pitted 15,000 Polisario guerrillas against Morocco's
U.S.-equipped army, ended in 1991 with a U.N.-negotiated cease-fire that called
for a referendum on the region's future. But U.N. efforts to arrange a vote
have been frustrated by disputes over who should be allowed to vote. About
200,000 local Saharawi people fled into exile and still live in refugee camps
in Algeria.
Return to Index
Nepal's
king holds first talks with India's PM since power grab
Agence
France Presse, 4/23/2005
Nepal's
King Gyanendra on Saturday sought backing for his controversial power grab in
his first formal talks with India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh since the
monarch declared emergency rule in February. Gyanendra met with Singh on the
sidelines of an Asia-Africa summit in Jakarta, officials confirmed, with the
two neighbours reportedly focusing on the recent political upheaval in the
Himalayan kingdom.
The Nepalese king sacked the government and suspended civil liberties on
February 1, a move he said was needed because squabbling parties were unable to
end a raging Maoist insurgency which has already claimed some 11,200 lives. His move prompted India and Britain to suspend
military aid to Nepal while the United States has threatened to follow suit.
Indian press agency UNI said that Singh had prioritised the unscheduled meeting
because there was a pressing need for the two countries to discuss the
situation in Nepal. "Nepal is the closest neighbour. You can choose your
friends, but you have no choice in neighbours," Singh was quoted as saying
by UNI ahead of the talks.
The meeting came a day after Indian Foreign Minister Natwar Singh pushed for a
restoration of democracy in Nepal in a meeting with Gynanendra. During their
"cordial" 45-minute meeting, Gyanendra "explained the
circumstances" that led him to dismiss the four-party coalition
government, while the Indian foreign minister expressed hopes of renewed ties
with Nepal.
"The two countries should return to the process of close
consultation," Singh said. "We believe that constitutional monarchy
and multi-party democracy were the two pillars of Nepal's polity." World
powers, apart from China and Pakistan which have called the upheaval in Nepal
an internal matter, have largely cold-shouldered Gyanendra since his takeover,
demanding a restoration of democracy.
India's foreign minister welcomed the release of some political leaders and the
announcement of municipal elections. But he also "urged that a process of
reconciliation" be initiated between political parties and the monarchy
leading to a return to multi-party democracy in Nepal. Singh also called for
"a speedy release of the remaining political leaders, the lifting of the
emergency and media censorship".
The Jakarta meetings came as Nepal freed 61 people, including a former deputy
premier Bharat Mohan Adhikari, held under house arrest since Gyanendra sacked
his government. Amnesty International reported Thursday that 3,000 people had
been detained in Nepal since the king's takeover of which 1,000 remained in
custody.
Return to Index
Negotiations
resume, but real peace a long way off in southern Philippines
Jason
Gutierrez, Agence France Presse, 4/18/2005
Negotiations
to end a decades-old separatist rebellion in the southern Philippines resume
Monday in Malaysia, but real peace will remain elusive until Manila reins in
various rebel factions and allows self determination among Muslims, according
to analysts. Malaysian foreign minister Syed Hamid Albar has said he believes
that the time is ripe for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to silence
its guns and sign a peace treaty with Manila.
The 12,000-strong MILF has been waging a rebellion since 1978, demanding that
Manila give it control over its "ancestral domain" and the people
living in it. Albar noted a "serious desire" from both parties to
maintain peace in the mineral-rich Mindanao island, the country's southern
third and home to the country's minority Muslims.
But Julkipli Wadi, a professor in Islamic studies at the University of the
Philippines, said Muslim dissatisfaction ran deep and it would take more than a
mere paper agreement to solve the insurgency. A lack of a strong leadership
among the Muslims who could unite the MILF and other armed factions, including
the Al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf and remnants of the former rebel group Moro
National Liberation Front (MNLF) also is seen to remain a problem in the
long-term, Wadi said.
The MNLF was formerly the country's main Muslim insurgent group from which the
MILF split in 1978. It signed a peace deal with Manila in 1996 and settled for
a limited Muslim autonomous region. The MILF was left out of the accord. A
"push factor" from the regional militant group Jemaah Islamiyah,
which intelligence reports said was forging links with Mindanao armed groups,
could also add to the problem, Wadi said.
"There needs to be a trouble shooter in the Mindanao peace process,"
Wadi told AFP in an interview. "There is an inability in the part of all
parties to talk in a more coherent manner. The peace process is currently
muddled and one area of the bottleneck is that no one knows for sure what had
happened to the MNLF-government peace agreement," he said.
While various MNLF leaders became politicians in the Autonomous Region in
Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and their fighters integrated into the military and
police, the region remains mired in poverty and sectarian violence. "Nobody
knows for sure what happened to that agreement and the question now is what can
the government offer to the MILF that would be unique from the MNLF," Wadi
said.
Randy David, a political science professor also at the University of the
Philippines, noted that the war in Mindanao has forced the Muslims to disperse,
becoming traders in urban centers. "Their assimilation into the mainstream
is skin-deep; they remain a separate people, steeled by their faith and bound
together by a shared dream to regain their homeland," David said in a
recently published article.
"Land is what the Moros lost, and a homeland is what they hope to
recover," he said. Wadi said a peace pact with the MILF at a time when the
MNLF founder Nur Misuari was in jail could be viewed by Muslim radicals as a
way of "politically and militarily easing out" the MNLF, Wadi said. This
could force certain MNLF factions to launch fresh attacks, like those in the
southern island of Jolo in February that left nearly 100 dead on both sides.
"That war was in preparation for the continued isolation of the MNLF by
their own doing so that by the time the government offers the possibility of
the ARMM to the MILF, they would already be standing on a position of
strength," Wadi said. A likely scenario would be that the MNLF factions
could renew alliances with the Abu Sayyaf, a small, but brutal group of Islamic
militants behind the country's worst militant attacks. The Abu Sayyaf is on the
US government's terrorist watchlist and is believed to be slowly forging links
with Jemaah Islamiyah.
Wadi said a stumbling block to the peace agreement is the MILF's demand over
its "ancestral domain", which traditionally means the whole of
Mindanao, once ruled by a succession of Islamic sultanates until they were
subdued by western powers who conquered the country.
Philippines
and rebels hail 'breakthrough' in peace talks
M.Jegathesan,
Agence France Presse, 4/20/2005
Government
and rebel negotiators Wednesday hailed a "breakthrough" in efforts to
end a decades-old Muslim separatist rebellion in the southern Philippines. A
joint statement at the end of a three-day meeting in this Malaysian port city
between delegations from Manila and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)
said formal peace negotiations were expected to begin within months.
Both sides "hailed the outcome of the meeting as a breakthrough towards a
just and durable solution to the Mindanao conflict," the statement said. The MILF has been demanding that it be granted
rights over its "ancestral domain" or homeland which traditionally
means the entire southern island of Mindanao, where they are fighting to
establish an independent Islamic state.
But MILF officials have said that they were willing to compromise on the
demand, without saying what they were prepared to accept. "Since the
inception of the peace process in January 1997, the Port Dickson talks marked
the first time that both sides entered into substantive discussions outside the
cessation of hostilities," the statement said.
"The panel decided to forge on with technical level talks in Malaysia to
exhaust all possible consensus points before the start of formal negotiations
expected to be held by mid-year." President Gloria Arroyo's chief
negotiator Silvestre Afable told a news conference that "the past three
days have been very productive exploratory talks. This is truly a breakthrough.
"This could not happen without the commitment of both sides and the
sincerity shown by the MILF. President Arroyo is very happy with the
development. We informed her that we have broken ground." The leader of
the MILF delegation, Mohagher Iqbal, told the news conference: "It was
very fruitful negotiations. I suppose if we can fully harness this issue then
we will be able to find a negotiated political settlement in Mindanao."
Iqbal was referring to the "ancestral domain" issue, which was the
focus of the talks. Asked for details of the breakthrough, Afable said: "I
cannot go into details but in the area of concept, territory and resources we
have some detailed consensus. "We have breached more than 60 or 70 percent
of issues in the area of ancestral domain. This gives us much confidence to
move ahead. The issue of governance is reserved for the next round of
negotiations."
Asked when a peace agreement might be signed, he replied: "There is
confidence on both sides but we do not want to state any deadlines." Both
sides said a recent outbreak of hostilities in Mindanao, where a ceasefire has
been in place since 2003, would not derail the talks and that they would
"strive to resolve all outstanding ceasefire issues."
The 12,000-strong MILF has been waging a separatist rebellion since 1978, when
it split from the larger Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF). The MNLF signed
a peace deal with Manila in 1996 and settled for limited autonomy. The MILF was
left out of that deal and MNLF leaders later became officials of what is now
known as the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), comprising several
provinces and cities that are mostly Muslim populated.
The MILF leadership had earlier said that the ARMM was a failure, because the
region remains mired in extreme poverty and that the nature of its framework
left it open to abuse and graft. More than 100,000 people are estimated to have
died in the conflict in the past 27 years.
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EU's
enlargement chief warns Montenegro against independence
Predrag
Milic, Associated Press, 4/19/2005
The
European Union's enlargement chief on Tuesday warned Montenegro against
breaking away from Serbia, saying doing so would jeopardize the tiny republic's
chances of joining the EU. "It has to be very clear that it (Montenegro's
independence) does not speed up the association negotiations," Olli Rehn
said in Montenegro, which is to hold a referendum on independence next year.
"It is likely that Montenegro's separation from the state union would
raise certain complications that would effect the fate of any ongoing
negotiations" with the EU, Rehn said. Believing it would speed up EU
membership, Montenegro's leaders have said that the Balkan republic would be
independent within a year, calling its union with Serbia untenable.
EU officials fear that further border changes in the Balkans could lead to
bloodshed similar to that which followed the breakup of Yugoslavia's
six-republics in the 1990s. Serbia-Montenegro is the union that replaced the
disintegrated Yugoslavia. "Believing that leaving the (Serbia-Montenegro)
state union would accelerate Montenegro's separate Stabilization and
Association Agreement negotiation process is not grounded on reality,"
Rehn said at a lecture to law students in Podgorica.
But Montenegro's leaders on Tuesday said a referendum on independence would go
ahead, probably next May. "Respecting international standards, we are
obliged to allow our citizens to determine the future of Montenegro, for
historic and pragmatic reasons," said a statement from Montenegro
President Filip Vujanovic's office.
An EU report released last week said Serbia-Montenegro has made enough progress
to start talks on the Stabilization and Association Agreement, which could lead
to negations on full membership. The troubled Balkan country is among the last
in Europe to get the green light for the start of such talks with the EU. The
report, which is to be formalized next week at EU headquarters in Brussels,
Belgium, praised Serbia-Montenegro on progress made over the past few months
but stressed Belgrade still must show sustained cooperation with the U.N. court
in The Hague, Netherlands.
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U.S.
government asks Sri Lanka, Tamil Tiger rebels to resume peace talks
Associated
Press, 4/19/2005
A
senior U.S. envoy Tuesday urged Sri Lanka's government and Tamil Tiger rebels
to resume peace talks and appealed to the guerillas to stop killing rivals and
recruiting child soldiers. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia
Christina Rocca said the U.S. administration may drop the insurgents from a
list of terrorist organizations if it "renounces terrorism by words and
deeds."
There was no immediate comment from the rebels, who have in the past ignored
such appeals. "We want the parties
to return to peace talks," she told reporters during a visit to the island
to see U.S-sponsored aid projects for tsunami victims. Rocca's visit coincides
with Norway's peace envoy Erik Solheim's visit to the eastern town of
Batticaloa, where he met Sri Lankan military officials.