Philippines, Rebels Forge Peace Pact

The Philippine government and the country's largest Muslim rebel group have reached a preliminary peace deal that is a major breakthrough toward ending a decades-long insurgency that killed tens of thousands and held back development in the south.

Philippine President Benigno Aquino III said the "framework agreement" calling for an autonomous region for minority Muslims in the predominantly Roman Catholic nation was an assurance the Moro Islamic Liberation Front insurgents will no longer aim to secede.

The agreement, announced Sunday and to be signed Oct. 15 in Manila, spells out principles on major issues, including the extent of power, revenues and territory of the Muslim region. If all goes well, a final peace deal could be reached by 2016, when Aquino's six-year term ends, officials said.

"This framework agreement paves the way for final and enduring peace in Mindanao," Aquino said, referring to the southern Philippine region and homeland of the country's Muslims. "This means that the hands that once held rifles will be put to use tilling land, selling produce, manning work stations and opening doorways of opportunity."

He cautioned that "the work does not end here" and that details of the accord still need to be worked out. Those talks are expected to be tough but doable, officials and rebels said.

Rebel vice chairman Ghadzali Jaafar said the agreement provides a huge relief to people who have long suffered from war and are "now hoping the day would come when there will be no need to bear arms."

The deal marks the most significant progress in 15 years of on-and-off negotiations with the 11,000-strong Moro group on ending an uprising that has left more than 120,000 people dead, displaced about 2 million others and held back development in the south. Western governments have long worried that rebel strongholds could become breeding grounds for al-Qaida-affiliated extremists.

One of the groups not party to the peace agreement is the Abu Sayyaf, which is notorious for ransom kidnappings and terrorist attacks over the last two decades. Its small bands of militants, mostly confined to jungles in two southern island provinces, continue to battle U.S.-trained Filipino troops.

"The parties agree that the status quo is unacceptable," the 13-page agreement says. It calls for the creation of a new Muslim autonomous region called "Bangsamoro" to replace an existing one created in 1989 which Aquino characterized as a "failed experiment," where poverty and corruption have forced many "to articulate their grievances through the barrel of a gun."

The accord also calls for the establishment of a 15-member Transition Commission to work out the details of the preliminary agreement and draft a law creating the new Muslim autonomous region in about two years.

Rebel forces would be deactivated gradually "beyond use," the agreement says, without specifying a timetable.

The Philippine government would continue to exercise exclusive powers over defense and security, foreign and monetary policy in the new autonomous region, where Muslims would be assured of an "equitable share of taxation, revenues, and the fruits of national patrimony ... and equal protection of laws and access to impartial justice," according to Aquino.