AFP aims zero NPA guerrilla front ‘within the year’

MANILA, Philippines — The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) aims zero New People’s Army (NPA) guerilla front “within the year,” AFP spokesperson Col. Francel Margareth Padilla said on Sunday.

In an interview over dzBB, Padilla reiterated that there is only “one weakened” NPA guerilla front left in the country.

“In process na po ito para ma-diklara na wala na. We are looking at really zero na active guerilla front, so isang weakened na lang po yan, within the year so hopefully madala natin yan to zero na po,” she added.

(It is in the process of being declared non-existent. We are looking at really zero active guerilla front within the year. Hopefully, we bring it to zero.)

READ: DND chief Teodoro not open to ceasefire with CPP-NPA

Earlier, Padilla said the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing NPA can no longer “stage major operations.”

A weakened guerrilla front means it can no longer implement its programs like recruitment and generating resources for the armed struggle, according to the AFP.

Even after attaining its goal, the AFP would continue to monitor areas where the presence of armed groups was detected, Padilla said.

Last December 18, Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. said he was not open to a ceasefire with the CCP-NPA after the group said it would not declare one during this year’s holiday season.

His pronouncement came after the CPP said that it “cannot” declare a holiday truce “in the face of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s regime’s relentless war of suppression, offensive military operations, and imposition of martial law in the countryside.”

Since its founding on March 29, 1969, the NPA has carried out the world’s longest-running Maoist insurgency.