Shining Path Returns - Opinion Column
The blackout that began in the early hours of Saturday the 18th, and lasted a couple of days in some districts of Lima, was officially explained as a technical failure. By coincidence, it occurred at the moment Sendero Luminoso was explosively celebrating the 16th anniversary of the start of the armed struggle, with a series of attacks not seen in a long time. It is likely, therefore, that the popular intuition attributing the blackout to SL is correct, and that the official versions increasingly resemble those from the early 1980s, which tried to downplay attacks so as not to frighten the population or damage the country's image abroad. Published May 23, 1996.