Presence of the Navy in the Ucayali River

Between 1989 and 1990, the Peruvian Navy applied a counter-subversive strategy based on terrorizing the populations settled along the banks of the Ucayali River and its tributaries. They used helicopter gunships to bomb different villages, considering them, a priori, as 'red zones'. Pucallpa's aguajales became the walking cemeteries of dozens of people who were kidnapped or detained by the security forces in raid operations. According to the Vicariate of Pucallpa, the Navy was mainly responsible for the discovery of mass graves, reports of disappearances and extrajudicial executions. By 1991, the change in counter-subversive strategy improved the image of the armed forces in the emergency zones of Ucayali.