La Cantuta massacre
La Cantuta massacre | |
---|---|
Location | Lima, Peru |
Date | 18 July 1992 |
Target | Students |
Attack type | Kidnapping and murder |
Deaths | 10 |
Victims | 10 civilians |
Perpetrators | Grupo Colina |
La Cantuta massacre took place in
The massacre was one of the crimes cited in the
Context
The Enrique Guzmán y Valle National Education University (Universidad Nacional de Educación Enrique Guzmán y Valle, or "UNE"; better known as "La Cantuta", from the neighbourhood in which it stands) was founded as a teacher-training college in 1822, granted its university charter in 1965, closed down by the military government in 1977, and reopened in 1980.[2]
Because of its remote location, far away from the centre of Lima, the fact that most of its students hailed from the impoverished interior of the country, and that most of them intended to enter the highly politicised teaching profession, La Cantuta gained a reputation as hotbed of radical politics, such as communism and anarchism as early as the late 1950s and early 1960s.[2] A series of student-led protest actions on the campus — including the blocking of the railway line linking Lima with the interior of the country — that led to the suspension of its activities in 1977.[1]
With the return of democratic rule in 1980, President
Abduction of July 1992
In the pre-dawn hours of 18 July 1992, two days after the Tarata bombing, members of the Army Intelligence Service (SIE) and the Army Directorate of Intelligence (DINTE), most of whom were attached to the recently established Grupo Colina death squad, burst into the residences of the Enrique Guzmán y Valle National University.[citation needed]
Once inside, the troops forced all the students to leave their rooms and lie belly-down on the floor.[citation needed] Nine students believed to be linked to the Tarata Bombing [citation needed] — Bertila Lozano Torres, Dora Oyague Fierro, Luis Enrique Ortiz Perea, Armando Richard Amaro Cóndor, Robert Édgar Teodoro Espinoza, Heráclides Pablo Meza, Felipe Flores Chipana, Marcelino Rosales Cárdenas, and Juan Gabriel Mariños Figueroa — were separated from the others and taken away.[citation needed] Meanwhile, in the staff residences, a group of soldiers broke into the home of professor Hugo Muñoz Sánchez.[citation needed] After searching his bedroom, they gagged the professor and led him away.[citation needed]
Prosecutions and amnesty
In April 1993, a group of Peruvian military officers anonymously released a document detailing the events at La Cantuta. Their document claimed the death squad had abducted the victims, tortured and murdered them, and then hurriedly buried them; later, they claimed, after questions had been raised in
On 6 May, Lt. Gen. Humberto Robles Espinoza, the army's third highest-ranking officer, publicly denounced a number of human rights violations committed by the SIN and the armed forces, including the La Cantuta killings. He was later dismissed from duty and subjected to death threats, and finally fled the country for political asylum in Argentina.[citation needed]
In June 1993, Justo Arizapana Vicente, a recycler, and his friend Guillermo Cataroca, leaked a marked map to congress man Roger Cáceres Velásquez and Radio Comas journalist Juan Jara Berrospi.
The military authorities had begun an investigation into the killings in May 1993. In addition, in December 1993, a civilian prosecutor filed criminal charges against several named members of the military. A conflict of jurisdiction thus arose between the military and civilian courts. The controversy was placed before the
On 21 February 1994, the Supreme Council of Military Justice (CSJM) sentenced ten of the perpetrators to prison sentences of between one and 20 years.[citation needed]
Following Fujimori's landslide re-election in April 1995, in another all-night session on 14 June 1995, Congress enacted law No. 26479, the "Amnesty Law", ordering the release of all police officers, soldiers, and civil servants convicted of or charged with civilian or military crimes during Peru's
Repeal of the Amnesty Law
The Amnesty Law was repealed after the Fujimori government in 2000 and, on 21 March 2001, Attorney General Nelly Calderón presented charges against Fujimori, accusing him of being one of the "co-authors" of this massacre and of the 1991 Barrios Altos massacre. She presented evidence that Fujimori, acting in concert with SIN supremo Vladimiro Montesinos, exercised control over Grupo Colina.[citation needed] The charges alleged that the group could not have committed crimes of this magnitude without Fujimori's express orders or consent, and that the formation and function of the Colina group was part of an overall counter-insurgency policy that involved systematic violations of human rights.[10][11]
Prosecutions and apology
In November 2005, Fujimori was detained in Chile. Peruvian authorities filed for his extradition to face charges arising from various incidents during his presidency, including the La Cantuta massacre, and he was returned to Peru on 22 September 2007.
On 8 April 2008, a court found a number of people, including
In October 2007, pursuant to a 2006 ruling from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the government extended a formal apology for the massacre and undertook to make amends to the victims' next-of-kin, including compensation in the amount of US$1.8 million.[3]
Fujimori's trial
During the
Lieutenant Aquilino Portella and the Dean of the Social Science Department of the University, Claudio Cajahuaringa, have also claimed that Professor Hugo Muñoz Sánchez and student Bertila Lozano Torres were involved with Shining Path. In the case of Lozano, it was claimed that documents allegedly in her possession revealed that she was indeed an actual member of the insurgent organization.[13]
In 2009 it was determined by a judicial ruling that not a single one of the victims in La Cantuta massacre was linked to any terrorist organization,[14] it was in the same ruling that condemned Fujimori to a 25 years imprisonment for crimes against humanity.[15]
See also
Notes
- ^ a b "Peru's Fujimori convicted of human rights crimes". Reuters. 7 April 2009. Retrieved 7 April 2009.
- ^ a b c Summer, Eva (1 July 2021). "Shining Path & Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement". LimaEasy. Retrieved 21 August 2023.
- ^ a b The Earth Times, Peruvian government apologizes for 1992 massacre. 26 October 2007. Retrieved 22 April 2008.
- ^ "CASO CANTUTA: LOS HEROES REPRIMIDOS Y OLVIDADOS". Retrieved 5 December 2014.
- ^ James Brooke (12 January 1994). "Army Officers' Trials to Test Democracy in Peru". The New York Times.
- ^ "MIT Western Hemisphere Project: The La Cantuta Massacre". Retrieved 5 December 2014.
- ^ "Vladimiro Montesinos ", Without Impunity. Vol. I no.2 (July 1998). Retrieved 22 April 2008.
- ^ "Fujimori Under Fire" Archived 17 June 2007 at the Wayback Machine, Revolutionary Worker. No. 918 (10 August 1997). Retrieved 22 April 2008.
- ^ World Archipelago. "Macmillan". Retrieved 5 December 2014.
- ^ Human Rights Watch, Questions and Answers Regarding Peru's Criminal Prosecution of Fujimori. Retrieved 22 April 2008.
- ^ The New York Times, Peru, Pressing Japan, Issues an Order for Fujimori's Arrest. 14 November 2001. Retrieved 22 April 2008.
- ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 May 2008. Retrieved 2 May 2008.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Sentence in La Cantuta Case - ^ a b "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 14 June 2008.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ "Víctimas de las masacres de Barrios Altos y La Cantuta no eran terroristas". El Comercio. Peru. 7 April 2009. Archived from the original on 31 May 2015.
- ^ "Condenan a Fujimori a 25 años de prisión por delitos de lesa humanidad". El Comercio (in Spanish). Peru. 7 April 2009. Archived from the original on 24 January 2014.
External links
- "The La Canuta Case". APRODEH.
- La Cantuta Case – Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
- La Cantuta Case vs. Peru – Inter-American Court of Human Rights
- La Cantuta – Truth and Reconciliation Commission, final report (PDF; Spanish)
- La Cantuta – overview (MIT Western Hemisphere Project)
- La Cantuta – summary of events (Spanish)
- Questions and answers about Fujimori's criminal prosecution – Human Rights Watch