PEACE UPDATE: Pres Aquino proposed to give Muslims in the south the ability to run their own government under their own flag as part of peace plan to end conflict

The draft law submitted by President Benigno Aquino III to Congress fleshes out a peace deal signed in March by the country's largest Muslim insurgent group, the 11,000-strong Moro Islamic Liberation Front. The autonomous region in the southern island of Mindanao, to be called Bangsamoro, would get its own 60-member parliament that would wield exclusive power over such areas as agriculture, trade, tourism and education. Under the proposal, Islamic Shariah law would apply to Muslims in the region, but the country's justice system would continue to apply to non-Muslims. The Moro group has renounced the terrorist acts of extremist groups, including the Islamic State, which seeks to impose a harsh version of Shariah law in areas under its control in Syria and Iraq. But at least three smaller Muslim rebel groups oppose the autonomy deal and have vowed to fight it. The autonomous zone, which generally covers five provinces, would replace an existing one, seen as a dismal failure. The new plan grants much more autonomy to the region, and Aquino's government also has promised to pour 17 billion pesos ($389 million) in special development funds over the next five years into the region, which has been stunted economically due to the conflict.