Peru: Current information on treatment of Japanese-Peruvians by the Shining Path and on attacks against Japanese-owned businesses

Please find attached a few documents that refer to attacks and propaganda against Japanese and Japanese-Peruvians, some of which are attributed to the Shining Path. These constitute the most recent reports related to the requested subject found among the sources currently available to the DIRB.

In a January 1993 report Americas Watch states that "Japanese have become particular targets, no doubt because of President Fujimori's extraction," and adds that three Japanese working in a development project and a Peruvian businessman of Japanese descent were murdered in July 1991 (Americas Watch 1993, 71).

Two news reports included with this Response (also found in the DIRB's Indexed Media Review) report the bombing in March 1992 of a Peruvian-Japanese medical clinic served by Peruvian doctors of Japanese descent (UPI 16 Mar. 1992) and of two Japanese restaurants (AFP 27 Apr. 1992). The reports state that a bomb disposal expert attributed the bombing of the clinic to the Shining Path, but no authors are named for the attacks against the Japanese restaurants.

A report from the Peruvian newsmagazine Caretas states that the assassination of the three Japanese engineers mentioned above was preceded by an editorial in the pro-Shining Path publication El Diario which attacked the nisei (persons of Japanese descent) and the Peruvian Japanese community (Caretas 15 July 1991, 24). The report states that the assassinations seem to add a new facet to the Shining Path's actions, by targeting niseis and Japanese (Ibid.). Caretas states that the fact that Shining Path selected Huaral, where a majority is of Japanese descent, particularly in agriculture and agroindustrial businesses, and a Peruvian-Japanese cooperation centre for attack shows the racism of Abimael Guzm n (leader of the Shining Path) and his followers (Ibid.).

What follows is a transcript of a section of the facsimile of an editorial from El Diario, as reproduced in Caretas, which could not be reproduced very clearly through photocopying and, despite the enlargement included with this Response, may not be legible when transmitted through a fax machine:

[... la reacción,] ahora que éste [Fujimori] es "presidente" lo ensalza ditir mbicamente [sic], poniendo de relieve la virtud "emprendedora" de los japoneses que, Fujimori siéndolo, har del Perú todo un "Japón Andino".

Sin embargo, bien sabemos que en nuestro país, muchos "emprendedores" pioneros japoneses sólo atinaron a promover la prostitución clandestina en los hoteluchos mugrientos de los barrios tugurizados o a explotar a pobladores humildes a través de sus pulperías establecidas en cada esquina de los barrios populares. Lo m s sano que pudieron hacer esos que inicialmente llegaron al Perú fue establecer un enjambre de tiendas de peluquerías y bazares diseminadas en los barrios pobres de las ciudades, mientras que en el campo otros m s extendieron sus dominios cultivando caña de azúcar y otros productos.

No es lo mismo pues, manejar casas de citas o una peluquería que conducir un país, aunque fuese enganch ndose a la carroza de la gran burguesía, ahora arrinconada en sus amurallados jardines con cerco eléctrico de alta tensión, como si ello bastara como escudo contra la ira popular.

What follows is an unofficial translation of the transcript, provided for your reference.

Now that Fujimori is "president" the reactionaries extol him, highlighting the "enterpreneurial" virtue of the Japanese that, with Fujimori being one of them, will turn Peru into an "Andean Japan."

Nevertheless, we know that in our country many "enterpreneurial Japanese" only promoted clandestine prostitution in the dirty hotels of the slums or exploited the humble inhabitants through the stores set in every corner of the popular neighbourhoods. The healthiest thing that those who first came could do was to establish a swarm of barber shops and bazaars spread throughout the poor neighbourhoods of the cities, while in the countryside others extended their domains growing sugar cane and other products.

It's not the same to run a brothel or a barber shop and to lead a country, even if done by hitching a ride on the bandwagon of the big bourgeoisie, now cornered in their walled gardens with high-voltage electric fences, as if that were enough to shield them from the popular wrath.

Additional and/or corroborating information could not be found among the sources currently available to the DIRB.

References

Agence France Presse (AFP). 27 April 1992. "Two Japanese Restaurants Attacked in Lima." (NEXIS)

                Americas Watch. January 1993. Peru under Fire: Human Rights since the Return to Democracy. New York: Human Rights Watch.

Caretas [Lima]. 15 July 1991. "Crimen en Huaral."

United Press International (UPI). 16 March 1992. BC Cycle. "Bomb Explodes near Lima Peru-Japan Clinic." (NEXIS)

Attachments

Agence France Presse (AFP). 27 April 1992. "Two Japanese Restaurants Attacked in Lima." (NEXIS)

Americas Watch. January 1993. Peru under Fire: Human Rights since the Return to Democracy. New York: Human Rights Watch.

Caretas [Lima]. 15 July 1991. "Crimen en Huaral."

United Press International (UPI). 16 March 1992. BC Cycle. "Bomb Explodes near Lima Peru-Japan Clinic." (NEXIS)