MANILA, Philippines—US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Friday the time was ripe for the Philippines to finally seal a peace deal with the country's largest Muslim separatist group and end a 30-year insurgency.

On a trip to Manila, Clinton urged both sides to broker an agreement before the end of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's term in June next year, warning that the negotiating environment could change under a new administration.

"The conditions for peace are ripe. People really want to see it. I hope no one misses this opportunity," Clinton told a nationally televised public forum, a day after discussing the issue with Arroyo and other top officials.

Clinton recommitted her government's support in helping negotiate a deal with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which has been waging a separatist rebellion on the southern island of Mindanao since 1978.

The Philippine military says more than 150,000 people have died due to the rebellion.

In urging quick action, Clinton recalled that her husband, Bill Clinton was close to sealing a Middle East peace agreement near the end of his time as US president.

But she said then-Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat had put this off, thinking he could get a better deal from Bill Clinton's successor. None came.

"So strike while the iron is hot, when people are in the mood and willing to make peace. Do not sleep, do not rest until we finally get there," she told a crowd of students at the forum.

Clinton said she believed Arroyo was "fully prepared" to make the difficult decisions necessary to achieve peace with the MILF.

"What I have often found is that it is easier to make these difficult decisions when you are on the way out of office. Because you know what is at stake and you are willing to brave the political fires," Clinton said.

Manila and the 12,000-member MILF signed a new ceasefire in July, 11 months after long-running peace talks were derailed by a series of deadly guerrilla attacks on Christian settler communities in Mindanao.

The attacks came after the Supreme Court rejected of a planned deal that would have given the MILF political and economic control over 700 territories it claims as its ancestral domain.

Both sides have said in recent months that peace talks could resume soon, but this has not eventuated.