Joma: Duterte kills peace talks by insisting on PH venue

LUCENA CITY — Exiled Communist Party of the Philippines founding chair Jose Maria “Joma” Sison said there was no more room left for compromise to revive peace negotiations with President Rodrigo Duterte’s insistence to hold the talks in the country.

Sison also said that if the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) accepted Manila as venue, the government might hold him and other NDFP negotiators hostage and force them to capitulate.

“Duterte is extremely eager to have me back in Manila as his hostage,” Sison said in an online interview from Utrecht, the Netherlands.

‘Intimidate negotiators’

“The site for the peace talks should be in a foreign neutral venue and not in the Philippines,” he added, referring to both panels’ Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees that was signed in 1995.

“Duterte kills the peace negotiations with NDFP if he insists on the Philippines as venue so that he and the military can surveil, control, manipulate and intimidate NDFP negotiators, consultants and related personnel.” —Delfin T. Mallari Jr.