• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
There will be no holiday ceasefire with remnants of the New People’s Army (NPA) in the Visayas, Visayas Command chief Lt. Gen. Benedict Arevalo said yesterday.
Arevalo said that they will continue their focused military operations against the communist rebels despite the agreement between the national government and the National Democratic Front (NDF) for peace talks to resume.
“There is no formal peace talks yet, it’s just exploratory talks,” he reiterated. “With that, our focused military operations will continue as well as our localized peace engagements with those who would like to return to the fold of the law.”
Arevalo said that the government troops will adhere to their mandate of ending the local communist armed conflict in the Visayas.
The Communist Party of the Philippines, the political wing of the NPA, will mark its 55th founding anniversary on Dec. 26.
In a statement, National Security Adviser Eduardo Año said that while fresh peace negotiations are a welcome development, he is not in favor of suspension of offensive military operations (SOMO) or ceasefire during the Christmas and New Year holidays, noting that the NPA also continue their anti-government operations during the holidays.
In previous years, the SOMO during the holidays had lasted for more than two weeks. | GB
