[QODLink]
people & power
The New Shining Path
We look at the reinvention of a Maoist guerrilla group and narcotics trade in Peru.
Last Modified: 29 Aug 2010 17:22 GMT

 

According to the United Nations, Peru now leads its neighbours, Colombia and Bolivia, as the world's leading producer of coca leaf, the source plant for cocaine.

Peru's government disputes this assertion but admits that production is increasing despite the best efforts of law enforcement.

It blames the rise in part on the protection given to coca growers by remnants of the Maoist Shining Path insurgency, which fought a brutal war against capitalism in Peru during the 1980s and 1990s.

Most of the leadership of that insurgency have long since been captured and are now serving lengthy prison terms, but deep in Peru's remote forests leftover elements of the Shining Path are carrying on the fight.
 
Filmmaker Fernando Lucena has been investigating the claim that they have also become hired guns for the narcotics trade. 

This episode of People & Power can be seen from Wednesday, July 21, 2010 at the following times GMT: Wednesday: 0600, 1230; Thursday: 0130, 1400, 1930; Friday: 0630, 1630; Saturday: 0330, 2030; Sunday: 0030, 0530; Monday: 0830.
Source:
Al Jazeera
Topics in this article
People
Country
Organisation
Featured on Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera's exclusive publishing of a key Guantanamo prison military document lays bare the brutality of force-feeding.
Former military official says poverty and anger in indigenous communities mean conditions for an "insurgency" are ripe.
A four-part series that gives a rare insight into the country on the move, with history in tow.
Series on the Palestinian 'catastrophe' of 1948 that led to dispossession and conflict that still endures.
Featured
China Rising
A four-part series that gives a rare insight into the country on the move, with history in tow.
Al-Nakba
Series on the Palestinian 'catastrophe' of 1948 that led to dispossession and conflict that still endures.
Syria: The War Within
Two years since the start of the uprising, rebels and Assad's forces remain locked in conflict.
China angles for Arctic power
China aims to expand its influence in the resource rich area.
Crisis in Bangladesh
Extensive coverage of war crimes tribunals and controversial calls for blasphemy laws.
join our mailing list