LATIN AMERICA : Peru’s Presidential Circle Embroiled in Death Squad Dispute

A general’s explosive accusations linking Peru’s army commander and the de facto head of the national intelligence service to the disappearances of nine university students and a professor have set off a new crisis in the government of President Alberto Fujimori.

Gen. Rodolfo Robles brought the controversial human rights case back into the headlines and sparked coup rumors when he sought refuge at the U.S. Embassy here earlier this month. He flew to Argentina with his family after releasing an eight-page, handwritten document accusing army commander Nicolas Hermoza and national security adviser Vladimiro Montesinos of having links to death squads.

The squads are “a machine of coercion, blackmail and annihilation, formed by a band of uniformed thugs who served the interests of two unscrupulous individuals,” Robles wrote, referring to Montesinos and Hermoza. “. . . It is necessary that this pair of delinquents be removed from the presidential circle for the good of the country.”

The disappearances from La Cantuta university, near Lima, last July, and the army’s reaction to an investigation of the case already have set back Fujimori’s efforts to show that Peru is headed back to democracy after his April, 1992, military-backed dismissal of Congress.

Fujimori had allowed a new Congress to be elected in November, but when it insisted on looking into the military’s role in the La Cantuta affair, Hermoza sent tanks into the capital’s streets last month in a threatening show of force.

The new accusations have forced the increasingly beleaguered Fujimori to seek a compromise between the skittish army and a congressional opposition outraged by the army’s clumsy attempts to block the inquiry. Although the top military court began its own investigation shortly after the congressional probe began, the army has refused to allow any implicated officers to testify before the lawmakers.

The affair has become an acid test of Peru’s intentions. At stake is the future of U.S. economic aid. The United States froze aid to Peru--about $100 million, mostly for anti-drug operations--after Fujimori’s “self-coup” and has hinged future economic aid on “the quality of democracy.”

“If there is no tangible demonstration of the subordination of the armed forces to civilian power, then the aid that has been withheld will remain so,” said Francisco Tudela, an opposition legislator who accompanied the chairman of Congress, Jaime Yoshiyama, to Washington last week.

One of Yoshiyama’s goals was to win release of the frozen aid; the other was to reassure the United States that Peru indeed respects human rights.

“We have the political will to go into the investigation until we find the truth,” Yoshiyama told a Washington news conference. Yoshiyama is a member of Fujimori’s party, which holds a majority in the 80-seat, unicameral Congress.

“Yoshiyama will try and seek a solution that satisfies the army,” Tudela said. “But the central question remains: Why don’t they want to testify? What are they hiding?”

Robles’ charges put the spotlight on Montesinos. A cashiered army captain, Montesinos is Fujimori’s trusted adviser on security matters and army promotions and is the architect of Peru’s anti-terrorism strategy. He is such a shadowy figure that some Cabinet members admit they have never met him.

Fujimori has reaffirmed his confidence in Montesinos in a radio interview, so few believe that the president will discard his adviser. Most observers also doubt that he will fire Hermoza.

“He’d lose face,” said Francisco Sagasti, senior researcher at Grade, a Lima think tank.

Sagasti said one option open to Fujimori is to find a scapegoat among the many officers implicated by Robles.

Robles’ accusations and the ensuing coup rumors sent the Lima stock market into a tailspin. And for the first time since the self-coup, when Fujimori’s approval rating skyrocketed to over 80%, the rating slipped below 60%.