Teodoro withdraws move for ceasefire with NPA (11:15 a.m.)
MANILA — A few hours after Armed Forces chief Alexander Yano offered an indefinite ceasefire with the Communist New People’s Army (NPA) rebels, Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro retracted it, saying it is not consistent with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s policy to make the insurgents irrelevant by 2010.
Yano had said Arroyo’s directive of solving the insurgency problem by 2010 does not entail only the use of arms.
But Teodoro said he did not receive any recommendation from the Armed Forces and that he has no intention of approving an indefinite ceasefire.
Teodoro said if the NPAs rejected it, “you can very well see the intention to continue to do acts of terrorism.”
“The order of the President is very clear: Make the insurgency irrelevant by 2010 and there should be no interpolations or extrapolations of that directive…No fudging, no hedging, no excuses,” he said. (JMR/Sunnex)
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