MRTA contents the event
Peru: Guerillas take the initiative
2
• Jean Dupont, Ernesto Herrera and
Balasingham Skanthakumar
"Our action is weakening
4
Fujimori" • interview with MRTA representative Izaac Velazco americas
Colombia: guerillas come out of
7 the forest • Eduardo Herrera
Mexico: the year of change
8
• Braulio Moro
Brazil: Electoral warning for Wor-
10 kers Party • interview with Raul
Pont, Mayor of Porto Alegre
Brazil: our party should be
12 different • Joaquim Soriano & Carlos
Henrique Arabe
USA: Profits up, concessions
13 demanded! • Dianne Feeley
USA: Reforming the Teamsters
14
• Dianne Feeley asia
South Korea in the streets • Jean
17
Dupont
Sri Lanka: enough is enough!
19
• interview with NSSP leader
Vickramabahu Karunaratne china: tries to isolate dissidents
22
• Zhang Kai middle east
Israel: national unity govern-
23 ment? • Tikva Honig-Parnass
Palestine: the road to hell • Tikva
24
Honig-Parnass
"Palestinian State" is a slogan
25 which has lost its meaning •
Meron Benevisti europe
26
Russia:
betrayal remembered
The new Communist project
27 ita
• Livio Maitan
Belgium: a most uncommon crisis
32
• Alain Tondeur regular features book notes • Sophie Massouri
34 reviews The Pink and the Black: a history of homosexuals in France since 1968, by Frederic Martel
NetWorking • our guide to
34
Internet action and hot addresses well read • a very incomplete
36 review of the radical media
2
International Viewpoint
"Audacity is the watchword of a revolutionary movement," Che Guevara said. Peru's Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) guerillas have been supremely audacious. They have planned and executed the Japanese embassy occupation brilliantly, even if the odds are stacked against them achieving their ends. Special report by J. Dupont, E. Herrera and B. Skanthakumar
The MRTA' usually operate hundreds of kilometres from Peru in the forested regions of Chanchamayo province. Their occasional forays into Lima and other cities have been for high profile actions like kidnappings and bank robberies.
The MRTA has always been a seconddivision player in Peru's civil war, which has mainly taken place between the regime and the Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso) organisation. Compared to Sendero, however, the MRTA has much more flexible tactics. The group has carried out a number of audacious acts, including the most elaborate prison escape in Peruvian history. In the 1980s they dug a 330 meter long tunnel into Canto Grande maximum security prison. Using miner comrades, they solved problems of ventilation and bracing, and used a theodolite compass to ingeniously come out at the right point in the prison, rescuing all 47 comrades, with no one killed.?
The MRTA has also tried to establish an "Americas Battalion," bringing together Colombian, Ecuadorian, Chilean and Bolivian organisations. Unlike Sendero
Luminoso and Colombia's FARC guerrillas, the MRTA has no links with the drugs mafia.
The MRTA went on the defensive in 1992, after the capture of their founder-leader Victor Polay Campos (Commandante Rolando). Some members took advantage of an amnesty law introduced by President Fujimori. In 1993 the group's two main areas of operations, the San Martin jungle in the north-east, and the Junin region of Peru were taken over by the army. Then Jaume Castio, the Chilean-born "number three" of the organisation, and one of its military leaders was captured. The President's office proudly declared on television that the MRTA had been definitively defeated. Shaken, but not dissolved
Despite these strategic and organisational setbacks, the MRTA began to re-group and re-organise, and prepare a strategy enabling them to re-appear on the national scene. On 17 December 1996, they occupied the residence of the Japanese ambassador in Lima, taking 500 hostages, including President Fujimori's mother, sister and brother.
The objective was to create a new strategic situation, characterised by a general amnesty, and the legalisation of the MRTA. This would be a "Colombian-style" victory, similar to the attempts made by that country's April 19th Movement(M-19), Popular Liberation Army and Socialist Renovation Current (a split from the ELN), all of which have created a place for themselves within Colombia's institutional framework.
Past military successes of the MRTA have not been reported by the Peruvian press or acknowledged by the government. Over the past three years, the MRTA has destroyed two military barracks, and four army helicopters. This latest MRTA action reflects a revised strategy, of focusing on a specific and
Peruvian guerillas take the initiative narrow demand, the freedom of 400 MRTA members held in Peruvian jails in return for the freedom of 73 hostages (from 500 initially captured). Commando leader Nestor Cerpa draws parallels between the fears and trauma of the families of the hostages and that of families of political prisoners languishing in Peruvian jails. The Embassy commando have certainly treated their hostages more humanely than the prison authorities do MRTA militants. Human rights
Peru's outrageous human rights abuses and the unbearable living conditions of the majority of Peruvians violate any imaginable human rights standards, and reflect the hypocrisy of western governments which normally turn a blind eye to the abuses of pro-capitalist regimes like Fujimori's.
An estimated 54% of the Peruvian population are Indian, and 34% are of mixed Spanish and Indian ancestry, Peru's governing elite are mostly white. This privileged segment of Peruvian society demands fierce repression of any who challenge their controlling status. As a result, widespread political dissent has been kept in check through institutionalised state terror.
In 1991 Alberto Fujimori was elected to the Presidency, defeating the novelist and candidate of the right, Mario Vargas Llosa. But far from following a social democratic programme, Fujimori embraced his rival's programme of economic liberalisation and privatisation and made Peruvians swallow the bitter medicine of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. In return, both organisations resumed loans and credit to Peru and encouraged foreign investment.
Fujimori has used his Japanese immigrant roots to portray himself as an outsider in politics and not beholden to the traditional political system and the rich white elite it has served so well. He has admonished the poor to work harder, be more self-reliant, save more and develop entrepreneurial skills and rely less on the state while making the free market their friend. Outside Peru he has used his ethnic roots to attract Japanese investments and as 'proof that he has the cultural attributes and work ethic to transform the country into a Latin American tiger economy. Fujishock
In 1992, Fujimori dissolved the congress and court system, and radically revised the Constitution. The near dictatorial powers assumed by the president following this autogolpe" (self-coup) were limited only by increased authority of his military supporters.
The government removed basic labour standards, and introduced large scale redundancies by halving the public sector payroll.
It privatised most state owned assets, reduced tariffs for imports and removed foreign exchange restrictions.
"Fujishock" policies tested the claims of the neo-liberal right and were found wanting not only on social criteria but even on crude economic indicators. Eighty percent of Peru's workforce is jobless or under-employed, and millions have little or no access to medical care. Until the "Fujishock" , half of Peru's 22 million people lived in poverty. The figure is now closer to 70%. The poverty factor was singled out by MRTA embassy commando leader Nestor Cerpa, "The MRTA entered this country's political life to fight a system that deprives the majority of Peruvians of their most vital needs. The situation has not changed at any time under Alberto Fujimori's administration. In fact it has worsened, with a dramatic rise in the number of poor in Peru."
The opening of the internal market to trans-nationals has driven many companies out of business. Peru's currency, the Sol, is trading at an artificially high level: good for importers of luxury goods but bad for exporters. Banks have pegged interest rates high attracting foreign capital but making it expensive for local capitalists to borrow for investment. The only alternative for Peruvian capital is to play second fiddle to foreign trans-nationals by entering into joint-venture schemes as junior partners.
The Peruvian economy grew in the early 1990s not because of Fujishock which, with its deflationary mechanisms, threatens a recession, but because it had become a desirable destination for portfolio investment capital drawn by the high interest rate and the fortunes to be made on the stock market through the purchase of grossly under-valued public assets.
Wealth is concentrated in few, mainly foreign hands. Fujimori, denounces the hostage taking by the MRTA, while holding the entire country hostage to the whims of finance capital: a notoriously nervous and fickle gunman.
The Fujimori administration rests on two pillars: the international financial institutions, and the military. The president's hand-picked loyalists in the armed forces hierarchy are intensely and personally loyal, with carte blanche to pursue their counter insurgency campaign, without fear of punishment for abuses and excesses. Rivers of blood
Amnesty International (AI) estimates that the Peruvian Government committed 53% of all extra-judicial assassinations between 1980 to 1992, and Shining Path committed 45%. Amnesty considers the MRTA responsible for only 1% of Peru's extra-judicial assassinations during this period.
An Amnesty International Report covering the period 19801995, documents thousands of "disappearances" extra-judicial executions and torture by members of the armed forces and the police. Even the United Nations Committee Against Torture (UNCAT) recently reported that "there exists a widespread practice of torture during the interrogation phase in terrorism related cases, and impunity is enjoyed by the perpetrators.
Peruvian human rights groups say that 700-1,000 innocent people have been charged and convicted since 1992. Declarations of sympathy with the guerrillas have resulted in prison sentences of up to 20 years. Lawyer Ronald Gamarra of the Lima-based Institute of Legal Defence estimates that one in three of those arrested for terrorism are innocent, including hundreds detained on false or coerced testimony.
According to Amnesty International, thousands of prisoners charged with terroristrelated offences have been "denied the fundamental right to a fair trial." Civilians have been "tried in military courts which are neither competent, impartial nor independent... " Military tribunals have a conviction rate of 97%. Since 1992, the international human rights group has adopted 86 prisoners of conscience who "have all been falsely accused of terrorism-related offences. Amnesty has also documented an additional 1,000 "possible prisoners of conscience."
The vast majority of human rights abuses "have never been effectively investigated," according to the Amnesty International report. "The perpetrators have not been brought to justice, and the victims and their relatives have received no compensation."
In 1995 the government passed two amnesty laws which according to Amnesty International "effectively closed all unresolved cases of human rights violations committed by the military, the police and other authorities, between May 1990 and mid-June 1995... (and) rendered void the few prison sentences handed down... to members of the Armed Forces and National Police." The people are tired
The tactics of Sendero (which operated on the basis that if you are not for us, you are against us") backfired against them. They murdered many progressive activists, from feminist leaders to Trotskyist militants. They would not tolerate any opposition or debate as to their ideas and strategies. The capture of their leader Guzman in 1992 has weakened and split them but they have not gone away. Their struggle and the military campaign against them consumed the lives of 35,000 people.
Revulsion at this waste, and growing
February 1997 #285 3
* the event disdain for armed struggle, increased popular support for Fujimori's authoritarian efforts to curb Sendero, and was a major factor in his re-election victory of 1995. Another reason being his blow against hyper-inflation, which fell from 7, 659% in 1990 to 139% in 1991 and a historic low of 10% in 1995.
Unfortunately for the MRTA, in the popular imagination, even in the barrios of Lima, they are often seen as little better than Sendero Luminoso. There is little popular support and sympathy for them in a country weary of violence and which longs to believe in the Fujimori promise of prosperity for all.
The Peruvian electorate are representative of a continental trend. Even with deeply unpopular austerity measures, they prefer the reality of economic stability associated with low inflation to vague promises from the Left. In Brazil, this was one obvious lesson of the defeat of the Workers Party (PT) by Collor de Mello and Fernando Henrique Cardoso. (the other continental lesson is the short lived effects of those anti-inflation measures.)
The MRTA as a legal party may have better prospects, but that path is fraught with dangers too. The group could go the way of the Colombian M-19, a left wing guerrilla movement later co-opted into supporting the neo-liberal economic programme. Or the URNG in Guatemala, which recently signed a peace accord with the government, which included a clause guaranteeing immunity from prosecution of the army personnel responsible for tens of thousands of disappearances' and the genocide of entire indigenous village communities.
Peru's traditional left', the populist APRA and the United Left (IU) fared badly in the 1995 elections and are seen as part of the discredited political establishment. They have the opportunity to rebuild their support in the months ahead by leading the anti-privatisation campaign which the left wing daily La República is spearheading, combined with assaults against the authoritarianism and corruption of the present government.
The events of the last six weeks may be the stimulus to a reawakening of the popular movements. But this depends on future events, and the practical interventions of the radical left. The fires still burn
Latin America's revolutionary and guerrilla struggles are an essential part of the programmatic and cultural inheritance of the continent's radical left. The lessons, good and bad, of the armed struggle experience have had a significant influence on the development of numerous social and political movements across the region.