Now that Peru's military can vote, candidates are wooing them with calls for amnesty

just like in argentina where they are still struggling to get past the "dirty war" that ended over 20 years ago, peru needs to find a way to move past its nightmarish past and amnesty for offenders is absolutely not an acceptable way to do it...

For the first time ever, members of the armed forces and police will be able to vote in elections in Peru, next April. These 150,000 newly enfranchised voters are attracting special attention from the candidates, which has given rise to fears that those accused of violating human rights may stand a better chance of escaping justice.

The leading candidates for the presidency and Congress in Peru have begun to call for an amnesty for soldiers who took part in the "war against terrorism," a term applied to the repression by state security forces of Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) and Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) insurgents in the 1980s and 1990s.

[...]

The last amnesty law for military personnel and police accused of extrajudicial executions, kidnappings and torture was passed in 1995 at the initiative of then president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000). It rendered void all sentences and all trials then under way against uniformed torturers and murderers.

[..]

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights condemned the amnesty law, but it was unable to prevent the release of military personnel and police accused of crimes against humanity.

[...]

The president of the Constitutional Court, Víctor García, and People's Defender (ombudswoman) Beatriz Merino have reminded the candidates that an amnesty, pardon or any other means of repealing sentences or cancelling trials against human rights violators are unacceptable from every point of view.

"They simply cannot be applied in cases of human rights violations," García said.

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