9
Allan García-Pérez, and left the meeting at his office to obtain a coffee; on his return
an assistant handed him a manila envelope bearing the stamp of the Press Office of
the President of the Republic. He opened the envelope, and saw that smoke was
issuing from it; he threw the envelope away from him with his left hand and heard it
detonate, as a result of which he lost his left arm, his eardrums were pierced, and he
suffered severe burns which almost totally incapacitated his entire left thorax; a
great power explosive had been used which, as communicated in a report form the
Inspectorate General produced in connection with Ministerial Decision No. 208/91
dated March 21, 1991, can only be handled by specially trained personnel. From his
investigations he learned that only four members of the Police Force had received
that training, one of whom is Commandant Juan Carlos Mejía-León. The further
stated that this type of explosive is only used by Navy units specializing in
demolitions and needs to be stored in a special environment. The Navy is the only
institution to possess that explosive, and no loss or removal had been reported. It
was the witness' view that Commandant Mejía-León participated in the manufacture
of the artefact used in the attempt on his life. In response to a question from Judge
Montiel-Argüello as to whether there was any connection between the attack against
him and the Castillo Páez Case, Dr. Zúñiga-Paz said that the Castillo Páez Case was
"the last straw." He mentioned two other cases that could have a bearing on the
attempt on his life, including the case against Mr. Allan García, and the case
concerning the homicide investigation in the "Caso de las Penales" He testified that
when Mr. Allan García first entered the Hall of the Chamber of Deputies he was
smiling, but that he became extremely perturbed when the expert opinion was
communicated to him; on leaving he said: "You will pay for this." The witness
therefore did not exclude the possibility that the attack was connected with other
cases.
f.
Report of expert Mr. Enrique Bernales-Ballesteros
He testified on the practice of disappearances in Peru and the situation of violence in
general (infra, para. 42). He related his experience with violence in Peru and
provided statistics on the subject: as of 1989, "Shining Path" (Sendero Luminoso)
had begun to escalate its activities in Peru, transforming the city into a hotbed of
armed political violence. He told how the disappearance of persons began to
manifest itself in parallel with this upsurge of violence, following the same pattern of
behavior that some military and police agents had used in the interior and in the city
of Lima, thus stepping up the number of disappearances in that city. There was
some distrust of the population, rural dwellers in the interior and students in the
urban centers, so that the Judiciary found itself pressured by the country's military
leaders. He explained that between 1984 and 1990, 1,916 cases of forced
disappearance in Peru had been communicated to the United Nations Human Rights
Committee, and produced documents to support that figure. In connection with that
statement, at the same hearing the representative of the State averred that
subversion had need of human beings to swell its ranks and that many persons had
been abducted many persons to join it and make it look as though they had
disappeared. However, the expert replied that most of the complaints were lodged
by the victims' relatives, who were present when the events occurred and who
blamed the military or the police. According to the expert, "Shining Path" was also
responsible for the disappearance of some persons, but the disappearance of most of
the persons whose names are known were reported by their families, who were able
to point to members of the military, and to a lesser extent, to members of the police
force as the perpetrators.