The Shining Path, or Sendero Luminoso, is an extremist offshoot of the Peruvian Communist Party. The goal of the Shining Path is the return to a collective, pre-Incan social and political structure in Peru, with shared land and a focus on indigenous control. Its most famous former leader is philosophy professor Abimael Guzman, who was captured by government forces in 1992 and remains in prison on a life sentence. The use of violence in Peru is the primary tool used by the group.
The current leader of Sendero Luminoso goes by the name Comrade Artemio. Violent activity by the Shining Path rebels has resumed in 2009, leading international observers to question how the Peruvian government plans to handle this latest round of attacks.
History of The Shining Path
Shining Path takes its name from the writings of Jose Carlos Mariategui, Peruvian philosopher and founder of the Peruvian Communist Party in 1928. Mariategui described a "shining path" that would lead indigenous peoples, mainly Quechua natives, to a pre-Incan, cooperative form of living, with land owned and worked communally.
By the mid-1960s, a splinter group, led by philosophy professor Abimael Guzman, formed as a reaction against standard communist principles. Naming his group Sendero Luminoso, Guzman blended Mariategui's writings, Maoist ideology, and his own personal beliefs to create a group that would overthrow what Guzman labeled an "imperialist", Eurocentric Peruvian government structure. Once overthrown, in Guzman's ideology the government structure would shift to an agrarian communist system.
The use of violence in Peru by Shining Path members began in 1980, following a decade of military rule in Peru. In reaction to unfulfilled promises of land reform for rural areas, Shining Path organized the burning of ballot boxes and boycotts of elections, declaring the existing government illegitimate. For the next 12 years Sendero Luminoso used destruction of infrastructure, town and village occupation, and outright armed attacks to make its point and to claim control over significant sections of Peru.
Abimael Guzman's Capture
In 1992, after an enormous effort by then-President Alberto Fujimori's administration to rout out Shining Path cells, lower urban violence in Peru, and regain control of the Peruvian highlands from Sendero Luminoso, leader Abimael Guzman was captured by military forces. Sentenced to life in prison, he remains imprisoned at the Callo naval base near Peru's capital city, Lima.
Activities by the Shining Path declined dramatically following Guzman's capture, and many extremist-group analysts predicted the group's demise. Abimael Guzman negotiated a lighter sentence in return for working to convince his followers to stop violent attacks. After declaring peace in 1993, Guzman received a sentence of life in prison, and more than 6,000 of his followers surrendered. Others remained committed to the Marxist cause, however, convinced that Guzman was coerced into his declaration of peace.
Resurgence of Sendero Luminoso
From 1992 to 2002 Sendero Luminoso was barely active, but the group's bombing of the United States embassy in Lima, shortly before then-U.S. President George W. Bush visited, killed nine people and resumed the group's use of violence in Peru. The December 2006 killing of five Peruvian police officers thrust the Shining Path back into the spotlight four years later. By August 2008 the Shining Path had initiated enough violent attacks that the Peruvian government launched a counter attack, aiming to capture and kill leaders. On April 21, 2009 the group killed 14 government soldiers in an attack, the deadliest Sendero attack in nearly two decades.
International observers question whether the attacks are from small, local cells of former Shining Path rebels, or part of a wave of new growth in the organization.
To read more about extremist groups and terrorism in Peru, please go to Lori Berenson - American Imprisoned in Peru.
References:
Peru rebels attack army outpost, killing 1 soldier
Shining Path Rebels Stage Comeback in Peru
"Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso)" in Extremist Groups, eds. Lerner, K. Lee and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner. Thomson Gale: Farmington Hills, MI, 2005.
Melanie Zoltan - Melanie Zoltan is a former college professor and administrator who has written for About.com, PCWorld, Brain Child, Thomson Gale, and ...
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