Pardon for Alberto Fujimori: the heartbreaking testimonies of the relatives of those killed during the Fujimorist regime

Gisela Ortiz, the former Minister of Culture and family member of one of the disappeared during Alberto Fujimori's administration, attended the Government Palace this Friday along with other bereavers. They spoke with President Pedro Castillo about his opinion regarding the recent ruling of the Constitutional Court ordering the release of the former president, after the reinstatement of the pardon granted in 2017.

“We are talking about an illegal Constitutional Court action that unduly benefits Alberto Fujimori, so there is no reason to believe in this request for forgiveness. We relatives have an inalienable right that is the right to justice. We cannot allow us to have institutions so fragile that they make decisions by violating the rights of others in order to benefit someone politically,” he said.

He added that what they are looking for are actions that show them that the lives of their relatives, the 30 years of struggle they have in search of justice, have not been in vain. And that there is a lesson learned so that these events are not repeated in the country.

He pointed out that any situation that means returning to normal for the Fujimori family, “know that it has been done by wrongly running over the memory of our relatives, taking away the little justice we had.”

Ortiz indicated that they are in the process of closing a duel for the relatives of the disappeared, but this is impossible. He argued that there are no mechanisms not only to heal those wounds, but to ensure justice.

“This country has also been built by us in a constant fight against impunity. We believe that our institutions, which are a guarantee that this works as the Judiciary and the Constitutional Court, really serve to look after our rights and not to trample on them,” said the former minister.

TESTI

One by one, Ortiz was introducing those who accompanied her to the Government Palace. One of them was Mrs. Martha Flores, widow of Pedro Huilca, a trade union leader who was murdered in 1992. There were also Cromwell Castillo, father of Ernesto Castilo Páez, a missing PUCP student; and Javier Roca the father of Martín Roca, a student at the University of Callao, tortured, murdered and cremated in the SIN.

Cromwell Castillo recalled hard passages of his son's disappearance: “On October 21, 1990, my son, a sociology student, was arrested in a public park. From that time on, the cops who arrested him until now we don't know anything about him. Despite the fact that the judiciary and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights have been used, the police officers were sentenced to 15 years, but they were 5 years old and are now free. This is the justice of our country.”

For his part, Javier Roca said: “My son was studying Economics in the third cycle, after they took a videocassette from him in the intelligence service, they raided my house. Not being able to legally charge him, he was kidnapped on October 5 after leaving the university and taken to the basement of the National Intelligence Service. For 20 days he was tortured, driven mad, executed and cremated. All this proved by the version of the material author of Grupo Colina. What has the State done to restore family members? I'm 83 years old, I'm going to die soon, but so far there is no justice. My son was innocent, he was a student, he never committed any crime, but he was shockingly murdered by the government, the military.”

Regarding the murder of Huilca, although the widow did not speak, from the final report of the Truth Commission, the following report is known:

On December 18, 1992, Pedro Huilca Tecse got up very early and after breakfast with his family went out to the garage in search of the car assigned to him by the General Confederation of Workers of Peru (CGTP).

He returned home to pick up his daughter, Flor de María Huilca Gutiérrez and his partner's son, Julio Cesar Flores Escobar, and together they left the house without any bad omen. The three of them went to the vehicle, and as soon as they got into it, the gunshots were heard that ended the union leader's life: “We went out and I sat next to my dad, and at that moment (...) I heard sounds like rockets, I thought they were rockets because it was December (...) when I looked up I saw people surrounding the carriage to the side where my dad was sitting, all boys.”

Martha Flores Gutiérrez, a couple from Huilca Tecse, witnessed the crime from the door of their house, as she had gone out to say goodbye to him: “When I was at the door of the house, waiting for my husband to start the vehicle, I see a man, of medium size, with a light blue shirt and a dark vest and he approaches and pulls a gun that looked like a machine gun from medium size, like the one used by soldiers, and shot him (...) the guy who shot him fled quickly. Then between 08 and 10 men appeared with guns and fired at the door of my house.”

Meanwhile, the daughter of the general secretary of the CGTP got out of the vehicle and tried in vain to ask for help. When he tried to return to his home, he came across a woman who had a gun pointed at the vehicle his father was in.

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