LUCENA CITY –– For top rebel leader Jose Maria “Joma” Sison, President Duterte’s silence on the peace talks with communist rebels in his State of the Nation Address (Sona) means the end of the quest for elusive peace to pave the way for an all-out war.
“The prospect of peace negotiations while Duterte is in power is none or vague” Sison, Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founder, said in an online interview from his base in Utrecht in the Netherlands Tuesday night.
“It means he doesn’t want peace negotiations. He wants war so he would have a reason for him to be a full-blown dictator,” he said in Filipino.
On July 18, New People’s Army rebels killed four policemen in an ambush in Ayungon town, Negros Oriental province.
The Philippine National Police immediately denounced the killings and accused the CPP of insincerity in pursuing a peace agreement with the government.