Peace advocates appeal to government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to stop the armed hostilities in Mindanao after the Supreme Court junked the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) for being unconstitutional.
Alarmed over the gravity of humanitarian crisis and the deteriorating condition of these war-ravaged areas, members of the Mindanao Peaceweavers (MPW) wrote President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and MILF Chairman Al Haj Murad Ebrahim to stop the armed conflict of both parties and return to the negotiating table.
Hundreds of thousands of civilians were affected after the Arroyo government ordered the Philippine armed forces for punitive actions against so-called rogue elements of the MILF.
Their appeal letter wrote: “there are now more than half a million internally displaced persons who are bearing the brunt of the ongoing armed conflict.”
The advocates further wrote that the staggering figure does not count yet the casualties on both sides of the combatants. Also, this excludes the hidden and long-term effects of the violence on women, children and the youth.
