Press Release
March 24, 2007

ANGARA URGES ALL-OUT PEACE

LOPEZ , Quezon - Senator Edgardo J. Angara said that seeking all-out peace in dealing with problems of political dissent and insurgency is the best policy for government as there is no better option than securing the peace through negotiations and broadening the countrys democratic space.

Angara, Chair of the Senate Committee on the Peace and Reconciliation, said that the policy of all-out peace will better serve the country from a strategic and pragmatic standpoint.

Angara said that shortly after assuming the presidency in 2001, President Arroyo announced she would adopt a policy of seeking all-out peace in dealing with insurgency-related problems.

The country should live by that noble and universally-acclaimed principle of seeking all-out peace, said Angara .

Angara said that a tit for tat policy is costly, diverts state funds away from development and engages the countrys soldiers in pockets of avoidable wars.

Money that can be saved from waging costly anti-insurgency campaigns can be otherwise used for modernizing the military for external threats, work of the army engineering brigades, civic missions that would help endear the military to the people, said Angara .

Angara said that a combination of sincere commitment to peaceful negotiations and dramatic economic and political reforms would isolate the dissidents who just want to overthrow the government to seize state power from those who want to better the lives of Filipinos.

The only anti-insurgency that works is a policy that aims at securing the peace through negotiations, that lifts the lives of people and that provides democratic space for the airing of legitimate grievances, said Angara .

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