PERU MAOIST REBELS REGROUP AS VOTE NEARS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000504510002-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 12, 2012
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: February 16, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000504510002-8
ARTICLE APPEAR=
ON PAGE ;?,3 _- PAC T-L
LOS ANGELES 'i'I'4ES
16 February 1985
Peru Maoist Rebels Regroup;
as Vote Nears
stepped-up Attacks by Sendero Luminoso:
Expected in Next 2 Months
U ' -
'tsy WILLIAM D. MONTALBANO,
Times Staff Writer '
f
!AYACUCHO, . Peru-Stung but
not defeated by a savage military'
counterattack, Maoist guerrillas
here in the Peruvian Andes appear
tc be regrouping for an assault
against the coming 'presidential
elections.
fiitirg interrogation and field
intelligence reports. we -informed
PVIruvian-sources here and in the
capita of Lima say the re e o
Sendero Luminoso hining a _
plan stepped-up attacks beginning
early next mont an extending
through the April 14 elections and a
likely runo ive or six weeks later.
sled by a one-time university
professor named Abimael Guzman,
Sendero Luminoso has wreaked
h4voc in the high Andes around
this colonial city of 60,000 people
since 1980.
7iigbts Abuses Alleged
,The counterattack by the Peru-
vian armed forces has been accom-
pnied 'by widespread accusations
of: human rights abuses by the
military. Of more than 1,000 people
listed as missing in the Ayacucho '
region, many were last seen -in
military custody. The insurgency is
claming about 10 lives per day, and
two-thirds of the :casualties are.1
civilians, who are preyed upon by
terrorists and soldiers alike. -
Iri recent months, military pres-
sute has apparently forced the
guerrillas out of some areas of a
131province emergency zone con-
trolled by the armed forces under
martial law. The numbers of ter-
rorist incidents and disappearances
have fallen' in recent months, but
both continue, the sources said.
T 5e- military campaign, however,
has failed to make any apparent
debt. in the intellectual leadership
of fthe.--guerrilla movement and
.seems not to have interrupted its
c dination or-communications.
ecial security services intel-
li rice unit called Scorpio has not
been- uccessful'in its sin le-mind-
ed ursuit of Guzman-also known.' l
by, the nom a guerre Camarada
Gdhzalo-and other Sendero lead-
ers.
Zany of the leaders, like Guzman
himself, are former professors at
Athe University of Huamanga here.
They are described as having grad-
uated from orthodox Marxism into a
radical "curse-all -others" Maoism
in thelate 1960s and early "70s.
?endero Luminoso guerrillas
blacked out Lima--briefly- earlier
th{ month in a carefully, timed
attack-on power pylons on the last
night of Pope John Paul U's visit to.
to terrorists .. .
have killed 1 % of our
pimple,' ofcials said.
Pei~u.. They also ignited the symbol
ofa hammer and sickle on a hillside
above- the city. Two slum -children
later told police that they were paid
about $3 each by a youth who .
loped like a university student to
seta the hillside fire, according to
prIs reports.
The attack during the Pope's
visit was part of what guerrilla
leaders are understood to be.calling
the "second consolidation .of com-
plebnentary actions of the second
wave of the first campaign."..
A" third "consolidation" is due to
start during the last week o Ms'
month, the intelligence reports in-
dicate, and will be followed by a
brie period of evaluation and a
second campaign in March targeted
on the election.
The' guerrilla movement, never
makes public statements o any
sorx., but Peruvian analysts piece
to ,et er sparse intelligence.- re-
ports to provide such predictions.
Rebel Efforts Impaired
1 the Andes, where two police-
men died in a Sendero Luminoso
attack on an isolated small settle-
ment. the same night as the papal,
blagkout, the Peruvian armed forc-
es have reduced the geographical
arga in which the guerrillas can
operate with impunity.
e guerrilla movement, whose
poorly armed foot soldiers are
manly Quechua-speaking Indians
from the poorest sectors of the
highest mountains in the Ayacucho
region, appears to have consolidat-
ed its forces in the high jungle on
the eastern slopes of the Andes
norsth of the town of Huanta.
by most estimates, the insurgen-
cy .has claimed about 5,000 lives
since it began in 1980. However,
there' are strong indications that
the carnage has actually been
mifch greater. In their own casual-
ty t count-not yet published
here=Peruvian security services
say that 3,246 people died between
January and December of last year
alcpe..
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000504510002-8
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000504510002-8
a
The` report breaks down the
casualties this way: 98 members of
the armed forces and security ser-
vi{ces,.1,001 guerrillas and 2,147
civilians, including about 60 local
Los Angeles Times
officials killed by.the rebels. The
report lists 1,200 terrorist incidents
of all" kinds in the first 11 months of
last year, including 372 in the
Ayachuco region and 258 in Lima.
In addition, there are a number of
reports-called credible by the se-
curity forces but without inde-
pendent corroboration --of heavy
bloodletting in clashes between
Sendero - Luminoso and self-de-
fense groups of peasants armed o
princi allwith which'have no roads or communi-
P Y machetes, sticks cation and which, in the best of
and stones. times,-,are remote from the rest of
A Peruvian civilian with first-' Peru=-and the 20th Century.
hand knowledge of the Ayacucho Still,: such reports are persistent,
area said 70 peasants and 15 guer- And they are symptomatic. And,
rillas died in one such clash near while-the consensus is that Sendero
the settlement of Paloma Alegre in Luminoso is hurting, nobody sug-
November. gents that it is anywhere near
Self-Defense Groups defeated.
Afterward; in a document filed The" government of lame-duck
with provincial officials .here, 43 President Fernando Belaunde Ter-
rY c?nti
nues to insist that. the
municipal officials in the area ap-
pealed.for military support guerrillas are foreign-inspired and
against foreign-supported, but there con-
the Sendero Luminoso. The docu-_ tinues to be no public evidence to
ment says, The terrorists have back up the assertion.
stolen our cattle, horses and sheep, Leading presidential" candidates
and our food . , and have,killed seem more inclined to believe that
I% of our'people:. Sender Luminoso .is a Peruvian
Since the Appeal was written, phenomenon. The guerrillas, who
Peruvian sources say, the Sendero say they are Peru's only true.
Luminoso have kidnaped woman Communists and revile all other
and children from villages whose Peruvian Marxists,"have"no overt
officials signed it and have beaten support ,anywhere within the Pe-
back-with heavy losses-several ruvian political spectrum.
frenzied attempts . by the peasants All presidential candidates=in
to free them. The guerrillas arp said ?cluding the Marxist mayor of Lima;.
-to have cut the throats of some who is likely to run second=have
{ hostages
a method th
t h
,
a
as re- vowed to wipe them out.
11 , e_
cently become the "
er
vorute manner of execution.
It is usually im ossfbl t
o
p verify
the details of reports of clashes in
isolated Andean -settlements,
Times ,reporter William . D. Mon=
talbano, ;based in Buenos Aires,
recently ._was on assignment in
Peru.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000504510002-8