Peru's president reportedly detained and accused of sedition
Source: The Guardian
Perus president has reportedly been detained and accused of sedition after he announced the dissolution of congress and the installation of a government of exception to rule by decree just hours before he was due to face an impeachment vote.
The countrys national police tweeted on Wednesday that former president Pedro Castillo had been detained, shortly after the countrys congress voted to remove him from office on Wednesday and replace him with the vice president.
That vote came after Castillo ordered a night-time curfew and the reorganisation of the judiciary and prosecutors office, which is investigating him for alleged corruption and influence-trafficking charges which he denies.
The congressional vote put an end to Castillos tumultuous 17 months in power which has already seen five cabinets, six criminal investigations and two failed attempts to impeach him.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/dec/07/peru-president-detained-pedro-castillo-coup
NNadir
(33,368 posts)chriscan64
(1,789 posts)who would let him slide because "he learned his lesson."
Judi Lynn
(160,211 posts)They've done this to all moderate to progressive Presidents, going through them like toilet paper.
FUJIMORI ON TRIAL
SECRET DIA INTELLIGENCE CABLE TIES
FORMER PRESIDENT TO SUMMARY EXECUTIONS
National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 237
Edited by Peter Kornbluh and Jeremy Bigwood
Posted - December 10, 2007
Washington, DC, December 10, 2007 : As disgraced former president Alberto Fujimori goes on trial in Lima, Peru, for human rights atrocities, the National Security Archive posted a declassified Defense Intelligence Agency cable tying him directly to the executions of unarmed rebels who had surrendered after the seizure of the residence of Japanese ambassador in 1997. President Fujimori issued the order to take no prisoners, states the secret roger channel intelligence cable. Because of this even MRTA [Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement members] who were taken alive did not survive the rescue operation.
The new DIA cable was released on the Archive Web site along with other declassified documents that shed light on human rights crimes under Fujimoris government, his close ties to his intelligence chieftain, Vladimiro Montecinos, and the two cases for which the imprisoned former president is now being prosecuted: the death squad kidnapping and disappearance of nine students and one professor at La Cantuta University in July 1992, and the massacre of a group of 15 leftists and an eight-year-old child during a neighborhood community barbeque in Barrios Altos in November 1991.
The documents were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by analysts at the Archives Peru Documentation Project. The project has provided declassified evidence drawn from U.S. records to Peruvian human rights advocates and officials for over a decade.
The prosecution of Alberto Fujimori is nothing less than a historic event in the history of the human rights movement in Latin America, according to Peter Kornbluh, a senior analyst on Latin America at the Archive. It is a major step toward truth and justice in Peru and the Western Hemisphere.
More:
https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB237/index.htm
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Fujimori also sterilized indigenous Peruvian women in a vile move, without their permission:
Perus government forcibly sterilized Indigenous women from 1996 to 2001, the women say. Why?
Indigenous women have been demanding justice ever since.
Analysis by Ñusta Carranza Ko
Under the authoritarian government of former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), thousands of Indigenous Peruvian women say they were forcibly sterilized under a family planning program launched to promote, prevent, cure, and rehabilitate reproductive health to the highest quality. Nearly three decades later, on Jan. 11, the first hearing on Indigenous Peruvian women who say they were coercively sterilized took place.
How did this happen? To find answers, I collected data through archival research, interviews of human rights experts and victims public testimonies. My research finds that the family planning program, rooted in colonial-era discrimination, targeted people of Indigenous descent who were considered to be the problem factor for economic development and sought to coercively control the reproduction of this group to help the economy stabilize and grow.
Family planning derailed
In its original form, the Reproductive Health and Family Planning Program implemented during Fujimoris administration via the Health Ministry was regarded by feminist activists as a progressive step toward respecting womens rights. It aimed to increase access to maternal health services. It also sought to provide women with more information about family planning and access to contraception. This approach and the very idea that women have reproductive rights put the government at odds with the Catholic Church, a powerful force in Peru. Seventy-six percent of Peruvians are Catholic; many abide by the Churchs teaching against contraception.
Despite church opposition, the program proceeded. Months into its implementation, however, irregularities manifested. Human rights lawyer Giulia Tamayo León investigated and found program officials had sterilized thousands of women against their will. My research shows that from 1996 to 2001, officials sterilized 272,028 people. The majority were poor, rural, Indigenous, Quechua-speaking women. Many women suffered medical complications and some died.
More:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/02/19/perus-government-forcibly-sterilized-indigenous-women-1996-2001-why/
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Fujimori's son and daughter are themselves deeply involved in Peruvian power politics, and have a substantial support from the right-wing racist oligarchy. They are ruthless.
Here's one quick google grab, taken for convenience, although there are articles far better ones which discuss her insatiable hunger for power:
NOVEMBER 29, 2019 7:53 PM UPDATED 3 YEARS AGO
Peru opposition leader Keiko Fujimori walks free from jail
By Marco Aquino, Maria Cervantes
3 MIN READ
Slideshow ( 7 images )
Fujimori, leader of the powerful right-wing Popular Force party, left prison in the Chorrillos district of capital city Lima, according to a Reuters witness at the scene where hundreds of supporters gathered outside in anticipation of her release.
. . .
I have lived though the most painful moment of my life, Fujimori told reporters, adding the decision to release her corrected a process full of abuse and arbitrariness.
Prosecutors allege she led a criminal organization and received millions of dollars from Odebrecht, which is at the center of a region-wide corruption scandal. Fujimori denies the accusations. Fujimori is the daughter of Perus ex-President Alberto Fujimori, who is serving a 25-year sentence for human rights crimes and graft.
Her release comes as Peru prepares for legislative elections in January after President Martin Vizcarra dissolved Congress amid a battle with opposition lawmakers over his anti-corruption campaign. Keiko Fujimoris party had held a majority in Congress before its dissolution.
The far-reaching Odebrecht scandal has swept through Peruvian politics. Earlier this year, former president Alan Garcia killed himself to avoid arrest in the probe. A number of other former presidents are also under investigation.
More:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-peru-corruption/peru-opposition-leader-keiko-fujimori-walks-free-from-jail-idUSKBN1Y401W
Dictator Fujimori employed death squads to slaughter human beings he disliked, a monstrous crime which should have been condemned loudly, universally, but it didn't really seem to bother any people of power anywhere, apparently. There's no question what kind of "ruler" Keiko would be if she ever could manipulate her way to the top.
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On edit:
By the way, the current Peruvian President has been a schoolteacher until his campaign. It was foreseeable they would be after him like heat-seeking missiles because he is a leftist. He hadn't been in office more than a few days before the hard-right was out after him, howling about corruption he hadn't had time to enjoy had he intended to go that way,
NYC Democrat
(295 posts)The president attempted to dissolve congress and rule by decree for some unspecified amount of time that would probably just be "until the crisis is over" but the crisis would never be over that's authoritarianism 101, and I oppose authoritarians in any form.
TheProle
(2,094 posts)StormKing
(243 posts)That's what it sounds like you're describing.
The guy got caught red handed trying to suspend the government.
Mmmmmmaybe he's the bad guy here? Maybe? Just maybe?
onetexan
(12,994 posts)AngryOldDem
(14,061 posts)(Rhetorical question.)