MANILA, Jan. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Philippine government will ask the United States to remove from its list of terrorist organizations the leftist Communist Party of the Philippines-New People's Army (CPP-NPA), as well as its founding chairman Jose Maria Sison, a senior government official said Wednesday.
Philippine government chief negotiator with the leftist rebels Silvestre Bello III, also secretary of the Department of Labor and Employment, said that the delisting of the CPP-NPA from the U.S. list of international terrorist organizations would put into fruition the commitment of Sison to President Rodrigo Duterte to return to the Philippines as part of the ongoing peace negotiations.
Duterte and Sison earlier agreed to meet in any neutral Asian country once the latter is removed from the list of international terrorists.
Sison, who has been self-exiled in the Netherlands, and the CPP-NPA, have been included in the individuals and entities designated as terrorists by the U.S. State Department since 2002.
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