The Moro conflict was an insurgency in the Mindanao region of the Philippines, which involved multiple armed groups. Peace deals have been signed between the Philippine government and two major armed groups, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), but other smaller armed groups continue to exist. In 2017, the peace council settled around 138 clan conflicts.
The root cause of the Moro conflict is associated in a long history of resistance by the Bangsamoro people against foreign rule, including the American annexation of the Philippines in 1898; Moro resistance against the Philippine government has persisted ever since. During the administration of Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos, political tensions and open hostilities developed between the Philippine government and Moro Muslim rebel groups. The Moro insurgency was triggered by the Jabidah massacre on March 18, 1968, during which 60 Filipino Muslim commandos on a planned operation to reclaim the eastern part of the Malaysian state of Sabah were killed. As retaliation against the Philippine government's failed attempt at reclaiming Sabah, the Malaysian government supported and funded the Moro conflict which devastated the southern Philippines, until support ceased during the year 2001.
Various organizations pushing for Moro self rule, either through autonomy or independence, were almost immediately formed in response, although these generally did not last long until University of the Philippines professor Nur Misuari established the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), an armed insurgent group committed to establishing an independent Mindanao, in 1972. In the following years, the MNLF splintered into several different groups including the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which sought to establish an Islamic state within the Philippines. When the MILF modified its demands from independence to autonomy in the late 2008, a faction led by Ameril Umbra Kato disagreed, eventually forming the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) in 2010.
Casualty statistics vary for the conflict, though the conservative estimates of the Uppsala Conflict Data Program indicate that at least 6,015 people were killed in armed conflict between the government of the Philippines and the Abu Sayyaf (ASG), BIFF, MILF, and MNLF factions between 1989 and 2012.
Origins
The Moro people have had a history of resistance against foreign rule for more than 400 years. During the Spanish–Moro conflict, Spain repeatedly tried to conquer the Moro Sultanate of Sulu, Sultanate of Maguindanao, and the Confederation of sultanates in Lanao like what it did with the former Muslim Rajahnate of Maynila (As the Rajah of Manila, Rajah Matanda was a grandson of the Sultan of Brunei, "Sultan Bolkiah" and a Princess of Sulu "Dayang-dayang Laila Machanai"). Although Spain succeeded in supplanting Islam in Manila and Mindoro, they failed against the Muslims in the South. The armed struggle against the Spanish, Americans, Japanese, and Christian Filipinos is considered by current Moro Muslim leaders to be part of a four-century-long "national liberation movement" of the Bangsamoro (Moro Nation).
The foundations of the modern conflict can be traced to the Spanish and American wars against the Moros. Following the Spanish–American War in 1898, another conflict sparked in the southern Philippines between the revolutionary Muslims in the Philippines and the United States military that took place between 1899 and 1913. On August 14, 1898, after defeating Spanish forces, the United States claimed the Philippines as its territory under the Treaty of Paris of 1898, establishing a military government under General Wesley Merritt as Military Governor. Filipinos immediately opposed foreign rule by the United States.