UNFC proposal: 4 out of 8 points to be re-negotiated
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Union Peace
Commission (PC), on the right,
meeting today with the Delegation for Political
Negotiation
(DPN), on the left, in Chiangmai. (Photo: NMG)
|
Today’s informal meeting
between Naypyitaw’s Peace Commission delegation and the United Nationalities
Federal Council (UNFC)’s Delegation for Political Negotiation (DPN) will
continue to seek agreement on 4 of the latter’s 8 point proposal, according to
Khu Oo Reh, the UNFC’s secretary general and head of the DPN.
“We may say that 4 other points have been agreed in
principle,” he says.
The said points are:
Point#1 Joint
announcement of nationwide ceasefire
Point#2 Establishment
of a Federal Democratic Union
Point#3 Participation
in all levels of political dialogues
Point#8 Implementation of development
projects in accordance with the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative
(EITI) procedures
However, 4 other points still need to be discussed for
both common understanding and agreement, he adds.
They are:
Point#4 Laws including the Union
Constitution to be drafted based upon decisions reached at the 21st
Century Panglong
Point#5 Prior agreement must be reached on
Military Code of Conduct (CoC) and ceasefire monitoring terms of references
(ToR)
Point#6 Formation of an independent
monitoring committee which shall include international representatives
acceptable to both sides
Point#7 Formation
of an independent mechanism to facilitate resolutions for disputes
“We are not pressing for acceptance of our demands,”
he explains, “only for joint endeavor to reach common agreements on them.”
On 3 March, both sides had declared that “agreement
in principle” had been reached on all the 8 points. “But we now have to
re-negotiate them again, as the Tatmadaw representatives informed us later that
they had not taken part in the agreement on 3 March.”
On the government’s side, (Lt-Gen retired) Khin Zaw
Oo said, “It’s time we reached agreement. We’ve been negotiating on the same
proposal for 14 months already.”
Tags: Opinion
