Reality bites

PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte has indicated he will not be rushed into signing a bilateral ceasefire agreement, much less resume the peace negotiations with the communists that he angrily terminated earlier this month, for all the small gestures of peace coming from the rebels.

Responding to a Communist Party of the Philippines announcement last Sunday that ahead of concluding a ceasefire agreement with the government, it had ordered its armed wing, the New People’s Army, to release six soldiers and policemen they have been holding captive, Malacanang said the President might be moved by certain “compelling reasons” to revive the aborted talks.