Four legislative decrees enacted by the Executive this past week have raised serious concern among human rights organizations, which believe these laws have been written to benefit specific people charged or convicted of human rights violations committed in the two decades of internal conflict.
The decrees, published September 1 in the official gazette El Peruano, are No.1094 on the police and military criminal code, No.1095 on the use and application of force by the military in national territory, No.1096 on the organization and functions of the police military court, and No.1097 governing legal procedures to be applied in human rights crimes.
Decree 1095, according to the Legal Defense Institute, IDL, covers the application and use of force by the military and police in national territory against “hostile groups” (Artcile 3.f), a definition so broad that it could be used to criminalize certain social protests, and more specifically protests by indigenous communities.
The most serious, however, is No. 1097, which decrees that criminal charges of human rights violations can only be applied to crimes as of November 2003. This effectively eliminates ongoing and new cases on human rights violations committed between 1980 and 2000, and could open the door to release several high-profile prisoners, including Alberto Fujimori.
Juan José Quispe, a lawyer with IDL, described Decree 1097 as a “legal holocaust.” Members of the paramilitary Grupo Colina, convicted of the massacres of Barrios Altos in 1991 and La Cantuta in 1992, “could go free,” he said.
Gustavo Campos, a lawyer on the Human Rights Commission, Comisedh, considers the law “an amnesty.”
Fujimori’s sentence would be called “offside” because his crimes “would no longer be against humanity,” said Carlos Rivera of IDL. “These decrees are only comparable to the 1995 Amnesty Law, because they seek to exclude all those tried for human rights abuses. Certainly, these decrees are more sophisticated, but their aim is the same, they are part of a campaign of the alliance between the government and Fujimorism, with the sectors involved in the corruption,” Rivera said.
In 1995, President Alberto Fujimori enacted a controversial amnesty law that pardoned the Colina death squad. The law was later repealed.
Additionally, DL 1097 gives judges the option to order the closure of criminal investigations and court proceedings –however complicated- after 36 months. Previously, cases could be extended when they involved groups of perpetrators and/or victims, and particularly in the case of human rights.
Gloria Cano, of the prestigious Aprodeh, said that many 1980-2000 human rights cases are still in the preliminary stage of investigation in the state attorney’s office because the Ministry of Defense refuses to hand over information. In many cases, as in those of Putis and Umasi, the ministry often denies any knowledge or having records of the events.
Cano mentioned the Mariella Barreto case as an example, an ongoing investigation for which Barreto’s body was exhumed recently for further forensic research. Under the new DL 1097, the lawyers of the alleged murderers “have already said they are filing a claim to stay the case and declare it definitely closed,” said Cano. Barreto, an army intelligence agent, was found dead in 1997 on a roadside in north Lima, her body parts in two plastic bags; her head was never found.
Carlos Rivera added that the law will most certainly lead to the closing of a number of cases, and specifically mentioned the 1986 Fronton prison case, which involves President Alan Garcia and Vice-President Luis Giampietri, the 1988 Cayara massacre by the military, the Castro Castro prison killings in 1992 that involves President Alberto Fujimori, the Chuschi murders by military and police in 1991, and the Cabitos military barracks murders in 1985 during the Belaunde administration.
President Garcia has remained silent against the criticism, but not his Minister of Defense, Rafael Rey.
“I don’t want impunity, I want to punish those who have to be punished, but not based on suppositions or statements,” Rey told the press.
He added that the Government “is not inventing anything” with DL 1097 because it is only “applying what is already law.” The procedural limits are included in the nation’s criminal procedures code which, Rey recalled, was prepared by a special commission that included several human rights organization representatives.
“If there is no evidence of a crime, the case has to be closed. That applies to everyone, and why not for the military and police,” Rey said.
Rey is a harsh critic of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, CVR, which recognizes that close to 60% of human rights crimes during the 1980-2000 internal conflict were perpetrated by Sendero Luminoso but also condemned the high rate of abuses by military and police in the counter-terrorism tactics.
The Human Rights Commission has taken steps this week for a hearing at the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, for action by the United Nations, andto file a claimwith Peru’s Constitutional Court.
The passage of these measures demonstrate that Peru is a sham democracy. It uses the outward symbols of democracy to mask its rule by a gachupin oligarchy that will do anything to protect the wealth their ancestors stole from the Incas. All these repressive measures do is insure the annihilation they will endure when majority tule finally comes to Peru. It is the measure of Peru’s corruption that they should even contemplate the freeing of the murderous members of Groupo Colina while keeping Lori Berenson imprisoned