THE LAST HOURS OF MRTA AND SENDERO LUMINOSO (EMBEDDING)

  THE LAST HOURS OF THE MOST DANGEROUS TERRORISM GROUPS (MRTA - SENDERO LUMINOSO)

The last moments of the 1990 decade, a great success appear, we are talking about the derrocament of the two Terrorists groups, MRTA and his leader, Nestor Cerpa Cartolini; and Sendero Luminoso and his leader, Abimael Guzman.

THE FALL OF SENDERO LUMINOSO (APRIL, 1992)

In 1990, for a sector of police from the Directorate against Terrorism (DIRCOTE), the answer had to come from intelligence, an activity that was not very serious at the time. This is how the GEIN decided to "Investigate to stop", that is, to reduce the greatest probability of suspicions to newly capture. He also meddled in the basic texts of the Senderista ideology to understand its modus operandi.

For our bad lucky, the GEIN only have a photo of Abimael in their teens and without beard, this make a problem in the attempt to locate his hidden site.

But some interesting new appears, on December 31, 1991, when a house was raided in the Balconcillo urbanization, in La Victoria district, where nine boxes with documents and other materials were found, in one of which was found the famous video "Zorba, the Greek ”, which recorded a meeting of the Senderista leadership.

The leaders of Sendero Luminoso were no longer ghosts, their faces came out of anonymity and the Gein took a big step towards its objective: the capture of comrade Gonzalo, who in the video appeared dancing with Elena Yparraguirre, his sentimental partner and number two in the organization.

So after one attempt more of locate him and the police tried to camuflate (disguised as beggars, musicians, garbage collectors, pollsters or street vendors), they arrived the light at the end of the tunnel. At 8:40 p.m. on Saturday, September 12, 1992, Operation Victoria was launched, which ended successfully with the capture of Abimael Guzmán in the house on Calle Uno 459, in the Los Sauces urbanization, Surquillo: "Positive for el Cachetón", repeated the police officers who entered the house. This starts the fall of Sendero in a lot of parts in Peru, for dominated the majority of the country to only locate in the VRAEM (place that nowadays their fighting to stay in there because of the military activities)

THE FALL OF MRTA (APRIL, 1997)

The MRTA, on the other hand, shared the same ideologies of revenge and revolution, his fall was seen since 1989, when in the Sierra Central start a confrontation of more than 100 Army soldiers, in the Puyhuan pampa, among the Huertas y Molinos districts, Jauja province, Junín department, against a contingent, made up of 67 members of the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) who headed towards Jauja with the aim of taking the city of Tarma (Failed).

This makes that Sendero start winning parts of the country and debilitating more and more the MRTA. The critic part was the capture of his leader Victor Polay Campos and other members, making the group worried and trying to survive.

So the last important attack that they made, was the famous Take of the Japanese Embassy in 1996, they captured more than 500 hostages, of which they released first women, elders and employees of the event, until the number of detainees was reduced to 72 men. In exchange, the assailants demanded the release of some 400 MRTA members imprisoned for terrorist crimes.

Alberto Fujimori's government held negotiations with the terrorist group for months while training a special operations military force. The training of this unit took place in a replica of the residence built on the premises of the Chorrillos Military School (Lima).

On April 22, 1997, after several failed negotiations, Fujimori made the decision to send this command, called 'Chavín de Huantar'. Eighteen people died in the operation: the 14 terrorists (with their new leader (Nestor Cerpa Cartolini), three soldiers and a hostage. 

Nowadays, two politics groups was created with other names, but the ideology they had one day, never changed.

In conclussion, we can say that this two groups suffer a lot with a new order in the Police, Military and the Special Group (GEIN), that helps to reduce at the mininum point, all terrorist attacks, making the exctintion of this groups. Nowadays as it said in the lecture, remain in small parts of the country, but the military is trying to destroy the last bastion of horror that Peru, never want to happen again.

REFERENCES

1. Bonifacio, C. M. (2020). Operacion Victoria: La captura de Abimael Guzman a manos del GEIN. Retrieved from: https://medialab.unmsm.edu.pe/chiqaqnews/operacion-victoria-la-captura-de-abimael-guzman-a-manos-del-gein/

2. Agencia Andina. (2012). Abimael Guzman: asi se fue estrechando el cerco para su captura en 1992. Retrieved from: https://andina.pe/agencia/noticia-abimael-guzman-asi-se-fue-estrechando-cerco-para-captura-del-cacheton-766341.aspx

3. CVerdad. (-). Molinos: La debacle del MRTA. Retrieved from: https://www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/pdf/TOMO%20V/SECCION%20TERCERA-Los%20Escenarios%20de%20la%20violencia%20(continuacion)/2.%20HISTORIAS%20REPRESENTATIVAS%20DE%20LA%20VIOLENCIA/2.7%20MOLINOS%20DERROTA%20DEL%20MRTA.pdf

4. Piñero, J. A. (2017). Cuando Fujimori fulminó a Túpac Amaru. Retrieved from: https://cadenaser.com/programa/2017/04/21/hora_14_fin_de_semana/1492774298_613045.html