Owner Of Drug Rehab Center Faces 8 Years In Prison

The owner of an unlicensed drug rehab center that was engulfed by a deadly fire over the weekend could receive eight years in prison, according to newspaper El Comercio, citing lawyer Mario Amoretti.

Raul Garcia Albornoz, owner of the Christ is Love center in Lima’s lower-class San Juan de Lurigancho district, turned himself into police following the fire on Saturday.

Peru’s Public Ministry opened an investigation into the cause of the fire, which broke out when two patients set fire to mattresses in an attempt to escape. The fire Read more…

Van der Sloot Pleads Guilty in Peru Murder

The judges hearing the trial of Dutch citizen Joran van der Sloot are expected to announce their sentence Friday, following Van der Sloot’s plea on Wednesday of guilty to the 2010 murder of Stephany Flores, a 21-year-old University of Lima business administration student.

“I plead guilty and I regret everything that I have done,” Van der Sloot said during a court hearing on Wednesday.

Van der Sloot, who is also the prime suspect in the 2005 disappearance in Aruba of US teenager Natalie Holloway, met Flores at a casino in Lima’s Miraflores district.

Read more…

EU to Support Anti Money Laundering Efforts in Peru

The European Union is to provide support to Peru to combat money laundering from the illicit drug trade, the head of the EU’s delegation in Peru, Hans Allden, said.

“It is a clear priority of the European Union to reinforce the ambitions of Peru and other countries (in Latin America) regarding money laundering, in a wider context of the battles against international crime,” state news agency Andina reported Allden as saying.

Allden added that the EU would support Peru’s implementation of its 2012 to 2016 Read more…

Cabinet Chief Valdes Says Development Needed for VRAE

Following an attack Monday by traffickers that claimed the life of one military officer and wounded four soldiers, Peru’s new cabinet chief, Oscar Valdes, said the government will tackle drug trafficking in the Apurimac and Ene river valley, or VRAE, by increasing development and state-presence in the isolated coca-growing region.  

Valdes, the former Interior Minister, said that development in the VRAE will include the construction of roads by military engineers, state news agency Andina reported.

“We are going to bring in the state first. We are going to bring the engineer battalions. We are going to build Read more…

Police Seize 155 Kgs Of Cocaine Paste In Southern Peru

Peru’s National Police on Friday seized 155 kilograms of cocaine paste from two individuals travelling on a highway between the southern cities of Cusco and Arequipa.

The seizure occurred early Friday and was part of operations surrounding year-end celebrations in Cusco, state news agency Andina reported.

The cocaine paste, worth approximately $60,000 in Europe, was being carried in 154 brick-sized packages that were hidden in suitcases in a private vehicle. Police Read more…

Report: Severe Crisis in Peru Prisons Due to Overcrowding

A report by Peru’s national ombudsman, the Defensoria del Pueblo, confirms the severe overpopulation in the country’s prison system.

According to El Comercio, which published excerpts from the report on Tuesday, Peru’s prison population as of July this year included 48,858 inmates, while the infrastructure only provides space for 28,689 people.

The highlighting of overcrowding in Peru’s prisons follows recent protests by residents living near the La Cantera prison in Canete, south of Lima,  Read more…

Family Members Behind Most Human Trafficking in Peru – IOM

Human trafficking in Peru is largely driven by families of the victims, rather than organized crime, the International Organization for Migration coordinator, Dolores Cortes, said during an interview with daily El Comercio.

Cortes said that in 2010 the IOM reported 253 cases of human trafficking in Peru, with 120, or 47 percent, in Lima, the capital. In second place for the number of victims is Cusco, where 14 percent of the cases were reported, followed by the Read more…

U.S. Seeks Partners to Support Peru’s Anti-Drug Program

Budgetary constraints are leading the U.S. government to seek other nations with which to share the cost of supporting Peru’s counter-narcotics program, according to U.S. Ambassador Rose Likins during the CADE 2011 business conference in Cusco on Thursday.

Likins’ announcement follows statements made earlier this week in Lima by William Brownfield, U.S. assistant secretary of state for the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.

Flavio Mirella, representative in Peru for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, UNODC, believes the U.S. should provide more resources to Peru’s anti-narcotics efforts but said that Brownfield’s message was a “good sign.” Read more…

Nineteen Years Later, Death Squad Victims Given Burial in Santa

The remains of nine men, kidnapped and executed almost 20 years ago by the Colina death squad, were buried this past Sunday at the cemetery in their home town of Santa, following a service led by Bishop Piorno of Chimbote.

A representative for Cabinet chief Salomon Lerner was present, as well as relatives of the La Cantuta university students who were killed in Lima, also in 1992, by the same death squad.

According to statements made by the families to the Truth Commission, CVR, the peasant farmers were taken violently from their homes, in the countryside around the coastal town of Santa, in the early hours of May 2, 1992, by seven or eight uniformed, masked men and one woman who travelled in several Read more…

Informal Miners Launch Protests Following Gov’t Actions in Madre de Dios

Informal miners in Peru’s south-eastern jungle region of Madre de Dios have launched protests in response to government actions that began  over the weekend to halt the illegal industry.

The Peruvian Navy and the police force began joint actions on Saturday that have led to the destruction in the course of three days of some 130 river dredges and other machinery used by informal miners, state news agency Andina reported. 

Fernando Valeriano, a Navy captain, said that each mission includes a prosecutor to ensure that no abuses are committed by the security forces.  Environment Ministry specialists are also on the mission, which is working on the Inambari, Read more…

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