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valign="top"><b><em>Survivors and family members
of victims of the massacre in Ayacucho on
December 15 denounce that the army treated
protesters like war targets, reminiscent of
violence faced during the internal armed
conflict.</em></b><br>
<br>
<b>By Zoe Alexandra</b>
<div><br>
On December 15, 2022, while helicopters flew
overhead, members of Peru’s national army <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/keep-anger-burning-2022-12-27-/t7jm88/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">shot down civilians</a>
with live bullets in the outskirts of the city
of Ayacucho. This action was in response to a
national strike and mobilization to <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/ent-peruvians-resist-the-coup-/t7jm8c/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">protest the coup
d’état</a> that deposed President Pedro
Castillo on December 7.<br>
<br>
On December 15, hundreds of university
students, shopkeepers, street vendors,
agricultural workers, and activists gathered
at the center of Ayacucho to express their
discontent over the removal of Castillo and
continued their mobilization toward the
airport. Similar action was witnessed in
several other cities across the southern
Andean region of the country.<br>
<br>
As protesters approached the airport, members
of the armed forces opened fire and shot tear
gas canisters directly at them. The firing by
the army from the helicopters proved to be the
most lethal. As the hundreds of unarmed people
ran for their lives, the shooting continued.<br>
<br>
Ten people were killed as a result of this
violence inflicted by the army, and dozens
more were injured, according to <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/eru-status-1606035946356342785/t7jm8g/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">official numbers</a>
provided by the ombudsman’s office. At least <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/-s-20-t-SAE1UlNF8K7BZYaT26C3sA/t7jm8k/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">six people</a> are
still fighting for their lives in hospitals in
Peru’s capital <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/rzas-del-orden-noticia-1454010/t7jm8n/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">Lima</a> and in
Ayacucho. Autopsies of 10 of those who died in
Ayacucho <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/-jovenes-muertos-las-protestas/t7jm8r/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">show</a> that six
of the victims died from gunshot wounds to the
chest. The youngest was just 15 years old.<br>
<br>
On December 27, Reuters reported how one of
these fatal victims in Ayacucho, 51-year-old
Edgar Prado, was shot and killed while
attempting to help someone else who had been
shot down during the protests.<br>
<br>
The exceedingly violent response of the
security forces to the anti-coup protests
across Peru was widely condemned. A <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/IDH-status-1605183772483530752/t7jm8v/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">delegation</a> of the
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
(IACHR) visited the country from December 20
to 22 to receive testimonies from local human
rights organizations and victims about the
violent repression suffered by protesters and
also spoke to families of the <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/-en-peru-estado-de-emergencia-/t7jm8y/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">28 fatal victims</a>.
The delegation traveled to Ayacucho on
December 22.<br>
<br>
More than a dozen other family members,
Ayacucho inhabitants, organizers, and a couple
of independent journalists, including myself,
waited on the sidewalk of one of the city’s
narrow and colorful streets as the meeting was
underway. As people came and went, much of the
events and tragedies of December 15 were
recounted.<br>
<br>
<b>The Massacre</b><br>
<br>
“They won’t show you this on the news here,”
Carmen (name changed) told me as she showed me
a video on her phone of a young boy with blood
all over his shirt being dragged to safety by
fellow protesters. “That’s her nephew,” she
said, pointing to a woman sitting on the
ground.
<br>
<br>
Pedro Huamani, a 70-year-old man who is a
member of the Front in Defense of the People
of Ayacucho (FREDEPA), was accompanying the
victims waiting outside the IACHR meeting. “We
have suffered a terrible loss,” he told me, “I
was present that day in a peaceful march
toward the airport.”
<br>
<br>
“When they began to shoot tear gas grenades
and bullets at us, I started to choke, I
almost died there,” Huamani said. “I escaped
and went down to the cemetery, but it was the
same, we were trying to enter and they started
to shoot at us from behind. Helicopters were
flying overhead and from there they shot tear
gas grenades at us, trying to kill us.”
<br>
<br>
Carmen brought over some of her friends and
one of them, who was wearing a gray sweatsuit,
told me, “We all live near the airport, and
saw everything happen. You should’ve seen how
they shot them down like animals. We tried to
help some of the injured, but it was hard.”<br>
<br>
The massacre in Ayacucho, as well as the
violent repression across the country, has
only intensified people’s <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/ent-peruvians-resist-the-coup-/t7jm8c/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">demand</a> that Dina
Boluarte step down. Boluarte was sworn in on
December 7 immediately following the coup
against Castillo. In interviews and public
addresses, she has justified the use of force
by police against protesters calling their
actions as acts of “<a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/-no-es-protesta-es-terrorismo-/t7jm92/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">terrorism</a>” and “<a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/vo-sobre-muertes-en-protestas-/t7jm95/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">vandalism</a>.”<br>
<br>
Huamani, while shaking and holding back tears,
said: “She is a murderous president and in
Huamanga, we do not want her, nor do we
recognize her as president because this woman
ordered the police and the army to shoot at us
Peruvians. And these bullets, these weapons,
are really bought by us, not by the army, nor
the soldiers, but by the people. And for them
to kill us is really horrible.”<br>
<br>
The anger felt by Ayacucho residents is also
linked to the historical undermining of
Peruvian democracy and the economic exclusion
suffered by the regions outside of Lima.
Huamani explained: “They took out our
president [Castillo] so this is not a
democracy. We are not a democracy, we are in
[state of] war, but not just in Ayacucho and
Huamanga, but also in Arequipa, Apurímac,
Cusco. In these regions, we are suffering from
poverty, we can no longer survive, we are
dying of hunger… and these right wingers want
to make us their slaves, but we won’t permit
this because we are responding and resisting.”<br>
<br>
<b>Old Wounds Ripped Open</b>
<br>
<br>
December 15 was not the first time civilians
in Ayacucho were massacred by the Peruvian
armed forces. Many who were present on
December 15 said that the warlike treatment
received by the peaceful protesters was
reminiscent of the days of the <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/ads-2021-09-amr460032004en-pdf/t7jm98/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">two-decades-long</a>
internal armed conflict that Peruvians
suffered through more than 20 years ago.
<br>
<br>
“They still treat us as if we were all
terrorists,” a family member of one of the
victims of the protests pointed out.
<br>
<br>
As part of the state’s <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/ads-2021-09-amr460032004en-pdf/t7jm98/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">campaign</a> against
the guerrilla insurgency, it tortured,
detained, disappeared, and murdered tens of
thousands of innocent peasants and Indigenous
people, accusing them of supporting or being
part of the insurgency.<br>
<br>
The population of Ayacucho was one of the
hardest hit. According to <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/ifinal-/t7jm9c/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">reports</a> by the
Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was
set up to look into the human rights
violations, of the estimated 69,280 fatal
victims of the internal armed conflict in Peru
from 1980-2000, 26,000 were killed or
disappeared by state actors or insurgent
groups in Ayacucho. Thousands of people that
fled their towns for the city of Ayacucho
during the conflict continue to search for
their loved ones and demand justice.
<br>
<br>
One of them is <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/as-heridas-se-reabren-ayacucho/t7jm9g/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">Paula Aguilar Yucra</a>,
who I met outside the IACHR meeting. Like more
than <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/ales-Est-Lib1568-05TOMO-01-pdf/t7jm9k/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">60 percent</a> of
people in Ayacucho, Indigenous Quechua is her
first language. The 63-year-old is a member of
the Ayacucho-based National Association of
Relatives of Kidnapped, Detained and
Disappeared of Peru (ANFASEP). She fled her
rural community in Usmay for Ayacucho in 1984
after her mother was killed and her brother
was taken by soldiers and never seen again.
<br>
<br>
Nearly 40 years later, she mourns again. Her
grandson, 20-year-old José Luis Aguilar Yucra,
father of a two-year-old boy, was killed on
December 15 by a bullet to the head as he
attempted to make his way home from work.
<br>
<br>
In a vigil held on the afternoon of December
22, Paula stood tall with the other members of
ANFASEP and held a sign reading: “Fighting
today does not mean dying tomorrow.”<br>
<br>
<em><b>Zoe Alexandra</b> is a journalist and
co-editor of <a
href="https://go.ind.media/e/546932/2023-01-05/t7jm9n/1224427459?h=MMf_0GbFxQNMnAW5yBLbjyTabRl-sjLDCtxdr92AwQ4"
moz-do-not-send="true">Peoples Dispatch</a>.<br>
<br>
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