Some political facts

Commandos releasing the Japanese
embassy in Lima, April 1997. Image © CNN

Thinking of Peru, many people will think about terrorist movements like Tupac Amaru or Sendero Luminoso. They also might think of a traditional Latin-American country, ruled by police and military and with a president who is just a strawman of the army-generals. A country with widespread corruption. A country where few people are extremely rich and many people extremely poor. And a country where innocent foreigners like Lori Berenson are jailed for life.

But in 1992 the main part of Sendero Luminoso, a Marxist terrorist group trying to eliminate Peru's fragile democracy, was minimised with the arrestment of its leader Guzmán. After that, little was heard from Sendero. The same goes for Tupac Amaru. In a last attempt to regain some influence, they captured the Japanese embassy in December 1996. Peruvian police ended the incident, and probably there is not much left of Tupac Amaru. Lori Berenson was one of them, although she was probably not involved in the embassy drama. She was not innocent. No wonder she was sentenced, but there is a big chance she might be released, only because the American president wishes so. Anyway, Peru is not the only Latin-American country struggling with terrorist movements.

In 2000, Peru had a very turbulent year. The non-democratic president Fujimori was set aside by the parliament and an order was issued to arrest the former head of the secret police, Montesinos. Many people were afraid the military would take over the country, but this didn't happen, thanks to the new parliament which fired the most dangerous generals.

So finally Peru is free and democratic, with Alejandro Toledo as the new and fairly elected president. And despite all probems of the last year it is one of Latin-America's fastest growing economies. Of course it is not rich, of course people suffer from neo-liberal shock-therapy, but at least there is the will to change. Due to strong economic reforms, the inflation has dropped and foreign investments have increased.