Emergency Zone: The Price of Peace

Shortly before new mass graves were discovered in Pucayacu and the terrible massacre of Accomarca, and before the government decided on a change of anti-subversive strategy to combat Sendero Luminoso, QUEHACER traveled through much of the emergency zone in the Andean region of the country. Our editor passed through Ayacucho, Huancayo, Huancavelica and nearby towns, and we were able to verify some of the reasons that urgently called for a prompt redefinition of that anti-subversive strategy. Ayacucho, August 1985: It has been a year since any Shining Path bomb shook the city of Huamanga. Now turned into a vast open-air market, the capital of Ayacucho presents a scene that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago: there are tourists — blond tourists roaming the historic city. Thousands of peasants who migrated to the city have turned it into a center surrounded by what we might call vast shantytown zones. But despite the absence of Shining Path attacks, the city's electricity supply is cut off every so often: the problem lies in shortages of fuel to power the generators. Quiet darkness? (Article introduction).