2 III. POSITIONS OF THE PARTIES A. The Petitioners 6. The petitioners stated that on October 2, 1992, Cory Clodolia Tenicela Tello, a merchant and a student at the Universidad Nacional del Centro del Perú (UNCP), was detained by Peruvian Army personnel in the City of Huancayo, Department of Junín, and that her fate and whereabouts is unknown since that date. They indicated that on October 14, 1992, Amadea Tello de Tenicela, the alleged victim’s mother, filed a complaint with the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor of Junín and that on October 26, 1992 she lodged a habeas corpus petition with Huancayo’s examining magistrate. 7. The petitioners indicated that on November 6, 1992 Ms. Tello de Tenicela requested information to the Thirty-First Infantry Division of Huancayo on the whereabouts of her daughter. They attached an official letter dated November 6, 1992 in which the head of the aforementioned military division, Brigadier General Carlos Torres Rodríguez, asked Peruvian National Police Headquarters for information about the alleged victim’s possible detention. 8. The petitioners stated to have requested the mediation of International Committee of the Red Cross in order to request information from the Armed Forces on the whereabouts of Ms. Tenicela Tello. They indicated that this attempt, the habeas corpus petition and the complaints filed with judicial officials and the members of the Armed Forces were unsuccessful and that the Peruvian authorities have not taken due action to investigate the disappearance of the alleged victim. The petitioners attached reports published in Huancayo newspapers in October 1992 denouncing the disappearance and presumed execution of various UNCP students. 9. According to public information, in the second half of the 1980s and the early 1990s, UNCP faced the confrontation between security forces and irregular armed groups of the Communist Party of Peru - Shining Path and the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA). Also according to public information, the growing control exercised by the aforesaid insurgent groups over university facilities and the assassination of employees and students opposed to their interference led to military incursions and to the establishment of an Army base on the UNCP campus in 1992. In this context, several complaints were filed alleging the forced disappearance and extrajudicial execution of dozens of 1 UNCP students and employees, supposedly by members of the Peruvian Army and the National Police. 10. The petitioners provided a copy of a ruling of the Office of the Fourth Provincial Prosecutor of Huancayo dated July 22, 2003 by which Cory Clodolia Tenicela Tello and 33 other victims were included in an investigation of the criminal offense of forced disappearance conducted by that office. The petitioners did not submit information regarding subsequent judicial activity, but they pointed out that the alleged victim’s fate and whereabouts remain unknown and that the State has not clarified the circumstances of her disappearance. Finally, they alleged that Peru is responsible for the violation of the rights enshrined in Articles 4, 5, 7, 8 and 13 of the American Convention. B. The State 11. The State indicated that, although Peruvian society experienced a period of political violence in the 1980s and 1990s, today “its authorities are working to investigate, try and punish the perpetrators of human rights violations, and its judicial bodies are evidence of legitimacy.” It stressed that the IACHR notified it of the petition in April 2010, “when the domestic situation is totally different from the one described by the petitioners.” 12. Like the petitioners, the State indicated that on July 22, 2003 the Office of the Fourth Provincial Prosecutor of Huancayo broadened an investigation on forced disappearance to include Cory 1 Final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Vol. V, 2.21 La Universidad Nacional del Centro, pp 683-688 and 694. Available at www.cverdad.org.pe/ifinal/index.php.