TAGUM CITY—“We are not killers.”
This was the reaction made by Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) chief peace negotiator Mohagher Iqbal on the claims of Senate Majority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano that the senator had been targeted for assassination by the former.
In a phone interview with Davao Today on Monday, Iqbal said: “Very sad! He was the one who declared that he is anti-MILF. Now he is accusing us of attempting to assassinate him. We are not killers.”
Cayetano claimed that an official intelligence report was handed to him confirming what he earlier learned from other intelligence sources—that a politician from Metro Manila will be sacrificed to ensure the passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law.
Cayetano believed that he was the target of the said threat after he publicly announced that he is “anti-MILF.”
It can be recalled that Cayetano was one of the legislators who withdrew sponsorship of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law following the Mamasapano incident that claimed the lives of the 44 PNP elite cops last January 25.
But the MILF maintained that such threat was far-fetched.
Iqbal said that the MILF would not surrender its members to the government who were implicated to the Mamasapano incident, saying it is not part of the existing ceasefire agreement.
“We should look at the protocols of the talks. If there is a provision in the agreement that states that we will turn over our members, we will do it. If there’s none, then we will not do it,” said Iqbal. (davaotoday.com)
