First modification:
The Peruvian president defended that the deaths that occurred in the protests after Pedro Castillo’s self-coup attempt “are being investigated” in the Peruvian judicial authorities, but rejected that these events be considered a massacre. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights, for its part, presented a report where it is evident that these executions were carried out by police agents in areas such as Ayacucho.
It is a harsh condemnation against the police actions of the Government of Dina Boluarte during the demonstrations that took place in Peru after the removal of former President Pedro Castillo, especially in the southern regions of the nation. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights described the deaths produced during these protests as “extrajudicial executions” because they were arbitrary murders committed by Peruvian law enforcement.
His investigation focuses on the period between December 7, 2022 and January 23, 2023, and specifically in the city of Ayacucho, where eight people were killed and 26 wounded by gunshot wounds while trying to take over the local airport. , in the midst of one of the strongest protests recorded in this nation.
The study has been carried out through the videos recorded by witnesses. Most of the protesters were young people from the area who were opposed to the seizure of power that Dina Boluarte had carried out to the detriment of Pedro Castillo days before, after what the Peruvian institutions considered a self-coup attempt by the former leftist president.
In its report, the IACHR adds that this “massacre” should be addressed from an “ethnic-racial” approach and affirmed that the State’s reaction was uneven depending on the region where the protests took place, being especially virulent in the southern part of the country. .
The text also mentions what was experienced in Juliaca, where 17 protesters died last January in clashes with the Police. “In that city there were situations of excessive and indiscriminate use of force by State agents, which would have resulted in serious human rights violations against both protest participants and third parties,” said the organism.
Dina Boluarte rejects the report and the conservative bench classifies it as “biased”
The reactions have not been long in coming from the Government of Dina Boluarte and her conservative allies in the Peruvian Congress. The president affirmed, shortly after hearing the news, that “like any report, there are questions that we do not share, but we respect, even more so coming from a body of the inter-American human rights system such as the Commission. In fact, we reject the alleged existence of extrajudicial executions and the classification of a massacre, even when it is conditionally mentioned in the events that occurred during the protests”.
The president of the Andean nation also indicated that it was “impossible” to draw such strong conclusions having been on the ground for between three and five days and denied any accusation of racism when treating the protesters.
A line that is also maintained by the Peruvian Prime Minister, Alberto Otárola, who pointed out that “it does not seem adjusted to the criteria of reasonableness and proportionality that the IACHR concludes that there were serious episodes of use of force with only one interview and two visits to Peru “.
Conservative congressmen were more critical of the text, calling it “toxic” and “biased.” From the Fujimori side, they pointed out that the text is “biased” and that it would be best “not to take it into account.” Statements that have even reached the request of the third vice president of the Chamber, Alejandro Muñante, to “withdraw funds” from the IACHR.
The protests in southern Peru lasted for more than two months and are a reflection of the political crisis that this Andean nation has been experiencing for years, with unstable and short governments that have fueled citizen tension.
The mobilizations occurred after Dina Boluarte assumed power after the failed self-coup attempt by former president Pedro Castillo, who was arrested and is currently in prison. These people accused the new president, who was Castillo’s vice president, of treason and demanded that she resign and call elections, something that never happened.
Boluarte currently has the support of the most conservative political formations in Congress and, despite the strong criticism he has faced, he has raised an iron curtain around the protection of his Government. In the aforementioned protests, the number of deaths exceeded fifty and the injured numbered in the thousands, most of them young.
with EFE
