Peru

Seven months in and, in the face of brutal state repression, the people of Peru continue their struggle against the neoliberal dictatorship of the US-backed junta. Clau O'Brien Moscoso The resistance to the US-backed coup in Lima continues to grow and to spread, despite the huge repression meted out by state forces. This article is reproduced from Black Agenda Report, with thanks. ***** National strike, day 196 On 19 July, over seven months after the parliamentary coup that ousted President Pedro Castillo, tens of thousands of Peruvians gathered in the capital city for the Third Takeover of Lima. This date marks the anniversary of the 1977 national march and strike against the military dictatorship of General Morales Bermúdez. The march and strike, whic...

BY JAN LUST Since the impeachment of Peru’s president Pedro Castillo on 7 December 2022, Peru has attracted the attention of policy makers all over the world. The massive protests that followed Castillo’s detention resulted in dozens of deaths, mainly caused by bullets from the army or the police. In this article, we discuss the origin and evolution of the political crisis in Peru and its economic effects. The victory of the Left in the Peruvian presidential elections of 2021 was a historical electoral result for the progressive forces which is only comparable with the electoral successes in the 1980s. The electoral win did not come as a surprise because, since the presidential elections of 2006, the results for the Left have been remarkable, especially in the ...

Comrade Guzman may be dead, but so long as the conditions that gave rise to his movement remain, Peru’s rulers will continue to fear his name. Ella Rule Subscribe to our  channel Not for nothing does the name of Abimael Guzmán stir fear and loathing in the hearts of Peru’s comprador bourgeois and their imperialist backers. His Shining Path guerrilla movement came very close to ending their blood-soaked and kleptocratic rule for good. https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/1214051476&color=%23ff5500&inverse=false&auto_play=false&show_user=trueOn 11 September 2021, the death was announced of 86-year-old Comrade Abimael Guzmán, otherwise known as Chairman Gonzalo, in a Peruvian prison. He had been incarcerated for nearly...

Can the anger and energy of the Peruvian masses be channelled so as to realise their dreams of liberty and socialism? Lalkar writers Subscribe to our  channel Peruvian workers have taken to the streets to demand fresh elections and the release of President Castillo, now languishing in jail pending trial on charges of ‘rebellion’. https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/1432388149&color=%23ff5500&inverse=false&auto_play=false&show_user=true For decades Peru, like many other Latin-American nations, has been trying to become a socialist country. It seemed that fulfilment of this aim may finally be at hand when, in July 2021, Perú Libre (Free Peru), led by Pedro Castillo, a modest, unassuming school teach...

BY W. T. WHITNEY Photograph Source: Mayimbú – CC BY-SA 4.0 Critics of U.S. interference in Latin America and the Caribbean may soon realize, is such is not the case now, that Peru has a compelling claim on their attention. The massive popular resistance emerging now amid political crisis looks to be sustainable into the future. Meanwhile, a reactionary political class obstinately defends its privileges, and the U.S. government is aroused. This new mobilization of Peru’s long-oppressed majority population manifested initially as the force behind left-leaning presidential candidate Pedro Castillo’s surprise second-round election victory on June 6, 2021. It exploded again following the coup that removed Castillo on December 7, 2022. The politically inexperienced Castillo...

Another president falls to a US-backed coup in Latin America – but the people are not taking it lying down. Proletarian writers Subscribe to our  channel Riot police and citizens clash during the Take over Lima protest on 19 January. Protestors are demaning the resignation of the coup cabinet, convocation of a new assembly and fresh elections. Since 7 December, when the Peruvian congress voted to remove elected president Pedro Castillo from office, arresting him on charges of sedition and high treason and replacing him with vice-president Dina Boluarte, Peru has been on fire. With widespread protests across the country, airport operations disrupted, railway services suspended and roadblocks in several regions, the illegitimate governm...

BY ZOE ALEXANDRA On December 15, 2022, while helicopters flew overhead, members of Peru’s national army shot down civilians with live bullets in the outskirts of the city of Ayacucho. This action was in response to a national strike and mobilization to protest the coup d’état that deposed President Pedro Castillo on December 7. 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. As protesters approached the airport, members of the armed forces opened f...

For decades Peru, like many other Latin American nations, has been trying to become a socialist country. It seemed that fulfilment of this aim may finally be at hand when, in July, 2021, Perú Libre (Free Peru), led by Pedro Castillo, a modest, unassuming school teacher from the high Andes, emerged improbably as the country’s leading political force. Castillo had campaigned on a left-wing programme which included giving huge new impetus to Peru’s education budget, nationalising mining enterprises and hiking up taxes on multinational firms operating in the country, calling elections for a truly representative constituent assembly to replace the sclerotic and endemically corrupt national congress, and drawing up a new constitution to replace the one dating from the mandate in the ...

BY CHLOE ATKINSON Photograph Source: Galería del Ministerio de Defensa del Perú – CC BY 2.0 Peru unrest highlights country’s instability As Peru experiences nationwide anti-government protests following the removal of President Pedro Castillo after what appears to have been an attempted self-coup, current President Dina Boluarte said she would not step down in the face of violent protests over her predecessor’s ouster as she called on lawmakers to bring forward elections as a way to quell unrest. Authorities in Peru also arrested six police generals on Monday as part of an investigation into corruption which authorities say Castillo was directly involved in. It is unclear if this was a self-coup or an imposed coup. Some of the leaders of the region’s countri...