Date: Thu, 15 May 1997 18:44:30 -0400
From: hariette-AT-easynet.co.uk (Hariette Spierings)
Subject: M-G: Red May in Peru begins... and imperialists and senderologists are crying!


Red May in Peru begins... and imperialists and senderologists are already
crying!


Copyright Reuters Inc.
Thursday, May 15  1997
Headline: Peru's Shining Path explodes powerful car-bomb
Byline: Andrew Cawthorne
Dateline: Lima

     Maoist Shining Path guerrillas fought police in a poor Lima suburb
early Thursday and then set off a car bomb that injured at least eight
officers and caused widespread damage. 

     The guerrillas, who had earlier promised to turn this month into
"bloody May," detonated 88 pounds of dynamite from a van that pulled up
near the police station at about 3:20 a.m. local time, police sources
said. 

     Minutes before, they attacked the police station from the rear,
engaging policemen in a firefight and letting off small detonations,
witnesses said. 

     "There was gunfire first," restaurant worker Enrique Baltazar told
Reuters. "That woke me up, and I saw a vehicle with smoke coming out. I
knew it was a car bomb, but it was too late. Everything came down on me --
doors, windows and even part of the vehicle." 

     Interior Minister Gen. Cesar Saucedo, inspecting the scene of the
attack, said eight wounded police officers were being treated in hospital
"but fortunately no civilians." 

     Shining Path members first approached the station in three vehicles,
he said. "They shot from the first vehicle, but police repelled them, then
they set off the car-bomb from the second" before escaping, he said. 

     Some police sources and a local radio station said 10 officers were
injured. 

     Propaganda was found nearby reading: "Long live the 17th anniversary
of the popular war -genocide armed forces and police forces" and "Long
live the street-vendors' struggle!" 

     The pamphlets, signed with Shining Path's formal name, The Communist
Party of Peru (PCP), referred to the group's May 17, 1980 launching of its
insurgency, and recent violent clashes between police and thousands of
street-vendors being evicted from their positions in downtown Lima. 

     The blast, in the heavily populated Ate Vitarte district, blew out
windows and doors in buildings all around the police station, knocked down
walls, destroyed nearby vehicles and gutted a neighboring local government
office. 

     The motor of the van, which was totally destroyed, was found one
square away along with other debris, witnesses said. A huge hole in the
road marked the site of the blast. 

     It was the highest profile guerrilla attack in Peru since the bloody
end to the four-month hostage crisis provoked by the smaller Marxist Tupac
Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA). 

     According to an police document obtained by Reuters this week,
Shining Path had warned it would mark May with attacks as a way of seizing
back the initiative after being overshadowed by the MRTA. 

     Shining Path was weakened by the 1992 capture of its leader, Abimael
Guzman, but has been regrouping in the last year and remains stronger than
the MRTA despite that group's international notoriety after the hostage
crisis. 

     "Even though these groups are isolated, socially and politically
defeated, you have to remember that they have not disappeared and have the
capacity for actions like this one," said leading guerrilla specialist
Carlos Tapia. "Lately we had not had any car bombs, because Shining Path
was weakened, but I think this could be the start of a campaign." 

     Police heads insisted they were on alert throughout Peru and noted
that the guerrillas' first attack on the police station Thursday had been
repelled. 

     The MRTA, which held 72 captives for 126 days at the Japanese
ambassador's residence in Lima, has also warned of reprisal attacks.
Peruvian troops burst into the residence April 22 to kill the 14 rebel
hostage-takers and release all but one of their captives. 

     Car bombs have been a common mode of attack in Peru during 17 years
of guerrilla violence that has cost at least 30,000 lives and $25 billion
in infrastructure damage.


Long Live May 17 (1980), day of the Initiation of the Maoist People's War in
Peru! 

Long Live May 17 (1997) the 17th Anniversary of the People's War in Peru

Committee Sol-Peru, London



     --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---