Ninety guerrillas from the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) have surrendered to the army in the southern Philippines before peace negotiations, the military said today.

The rebels turned themselves in on Monday and handed over a cache of weapons to the 602nd Infantry Brigade in the town of Carmen in the main southern island of Mindanao, the military said in a statement.

"The rebels are presently undergoing custodial debriefing," it said.

The MILF has been waging a rebellion for an Islamic state in Mindanao since 1978, when it broke off from the larger Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF).

The MNLF in 1996 won limited autonomy from the government after signing a peace pact, but Muslim areas remain among the poorest in the country. The MILF, as well as the more radical Abu Sayyaf gang, were left out of the peace deal.

The MILF in 2002 signed a ceasefire with Manila and later denounced links to foreign terrorist organisations, paving the way for peace negotiations.

Malaysia peace-broker

It is set to resume talks with Manila soon after the government last week cleared senior MILF members of involvement in a spate of bombings in the south last year.

The talks are to be held in Malaysia, which played a key role in the Philippine-MNLF peace accord and is also brokering the talks with the MILF.

President Gloria Arroyo's spokesman said Malaysia and fellow Organisation of the Islamic Conference member Brunei will send teams to monitor the ceasefire in October.

A nine-member Malaysian advance team will arrive on Friday to lay the groundwork for the full deployment, Ignacio Bunye said.

Earlier Malaysian Defence Minister Najib Razak said eight officers would arrive in Manila on Friday and a team of 60 - 51 army officers, five policemen and four foreign ministry officials - would arrive by Oct 9.

Bunye said Brunei would contribute 10 men to the monitoring team.