Sofia Zobel '86
Marc Dualan '81
Carmen Jimenez-Ong '91
Civil War Could Resume

SE Asia Headline News
BALITA 4/2000
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Summary

At a recent leadership conference in the southern Philippines, the Islamic Command Council (ICC) announced that it will resume its guerrilla war against the government after nearly four years of tenuous peace. By itself, this single organization cannot re-spark the country's dormant civil war. But there is widespread guerrilla dissatisfaction with the implementation of the 1996 peace accord. The country is also stressed by economic and political problems. The group's announcement appears to presage the return of full-scale civil war to the Philippines.

Analysis

On March 12, the Islamic Command Council (ICC) announced at a press conference in the southern province of Lano del Sur that it would resume its guerrilla war against the Philippine government. The council is a faction of the country's former rebel front, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF). At the press conference, a spokesman for the group claimed that it comprised nearly 90 percent of the original 20,000-25,000 MNLF forces. About 100 heavily armed members appeared before the media.

On an immediate level, the ICC is calling for an independent Islamic state in Mindanao. The group notes that that the Philippine government co-opted MNLF leader Nur Misuari, who signed a 1996 peace accord with the government putting an end to the civil war in exchange for autonomy - not independence - for the Moro people. At the conclusion of its leadership conference, an ICC spokesman warned that "aside from self-determination and the establishment of an Islamic state, the only way out here is through mutual destruction," according to the Manila Times.

By itself, the ICC presents a limited military threat. But the announcement may trigger the resumption of a long-simmering conflict in the southern Philippines; dissatisfaction has risen among other former MNLF guerrillas because of the slow pace in which the peace accord has been implemented. Talks with other separatists have been stalemated. On many fronts, the 1996 peace accords appear to be failing. The government in Manila is striking an increasingly harder line, as well.
  (c) 2000, Stratfor, Inc. http://www.stratfor.com

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