IACHR Meets With Peruvian Victims of Forced Sterilizations

[Judi Lynn]

Women victims of forced sterilization from the cities of Cusco, Anta, Quispicanchis, and Canchis demand justice in Lima, Peru, Nov. 13, 2018. | Photo: Twitter/ @EdgarOchoaPezo

Published 7 December 2020

During Alberto Fujimori's administration, 244,234 women and 20,693 men were irreversibly sterilized as part of national family planning policies.

An Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) delegation met with women victims of forced sterilization in Peru to support their struggle for justice.

"We are committed in spread your voices. It is lamentable that 24 years have passed, and that there is no political will to do justice," IACHR official Stuardo Ralon said.

During the meeting, representatives of Peru's Association of Women Affected by Forced Sterilization (AMPAEF) explained the impact that the sterilization policy of ex-President Alberto Fujimori (1995-2000) had on their physical and mental health.

"Presidents who followed Fujimori have denied the political responsibility of these inhumane acts. Our files have been archived for 20 years," victim Maria Mogollon said.

More:
https://www.telesurenglish.net//news/IACHR-Meets-With-Peruvian-Victims-of-Forced-Sterilizations-20201207-0013.html

[Judi Lynn]

1. Fujimori's Forced Sterilizations Targeted Indigenous Women

Alberto Fujimori attends a trial as a witness at the navy base in Callao, Peru, in March. | Photo: Reuters

Published 15 November 2018

The case against Peru’s former dictator Alberto Fujimori for the forced sterilization of over 200,000 Indigenous women and over 22,000 men between 1990 and 2000 is gaining traction after 16 years of litigation. On Monday, state prosecutor Marcelita Gutierrez formalized the case against Fujimori, accusing him and four members of his cabinet of being material authors of the crime.

In an interview with NODAL, Maria Ysabel Cedano, lawyer and director of the Study for the Defense of Women's Rights (DEMUS), who represents at least two victims, explained the importance of the accusation filed by the First National Criminal Court in the case against Fujimori and how justice may finally be served to him and his former health ministers.

Cedano says that for 16 years the public prosecutor's office had delayed the case and delegitimized the thousands of complaints made to the office, dismissing them as common crimes rather than systematic state human rights violations.

The lawyer explains that between 1996 and 2000 the Health Department’s Program of Family Planning and Sexual and Reproductive Health sent vans into Peru’s poorest regions and tricked men and women into sterilization.

More:
https://www.telesurenglish.net//news/Fujimoris-Forced-Sterilizations-Targeted-Indigenous-Women-20181114-0029.html