Revolutionary Worker #1015, July 25, 1999
On the morning of July 14, Peru's U.S.-backed dictator Alberto Fujimori announced to the media that the government military had captured Comrade Feliciano, who has been providing leadership to the Communist Party of Peru (PCP) and the People's War. According to reports in the press, Fujimori personally oversaw a military sweep of the central jungle area east of Lima by 1,500 troops--aimed specifically against Comrade Feliciano. While the actual story here is not yet entirely clear, it is very clear that the bloody handprints of the U.S. imperialists are on this operation. Washington supplies the Fujimori regime with military aid and "expertise" of the CIA and other intelligence agencies. This old reactionary state power serves U.S. economic and political interests and the U.S. does continuous work to prop it up and to attack the new revolutionary power of the people.
Since the 1992 capture of Chairman Gonzalo, Comrade Feliciano and the PCP Central Committee have been heroically leading the Maoist People's War in a difficult situation. They have faced not only the brutal counter-revolutionary war carried out by the Fujimori regime and its U.S. imperialist master, but also a Right Opportunist Line that arose from within the Party and which called for abandoning the People's War. The Party's stance has remained firm. As the PCP said in a 1998 document, "The People's War is the people's road to emancipation and the winning of a new society..."
With the 1992 capture of Chairman Gonzalo, the regime loudly proclaimed the death of the revolution. The PCP has proven them liars. Today, as they report capturing Comrade Feliciano, the reactionaries once again make the same claims. But the conditions that gave rise to the People's War continue to exist. And the resistance of the masses and the basic line of the Party will continue to fuel the People's War in Peru.
Even some more sober media accounts recognize the underlying problem. One such U.S. news account said that this insurgency has proved "notoriously tough to eliminate because their communist philosophy continues to appeal to the desperately poor segments of the population." (Chicago Tribune, July 15.)
We have just received the early news of this reported capture and we will continue to report as we learn more about it. But it is absolutely clear that the attack on Comrade Feliciano is a crime and must be condemned.
And the struggle against this new attack must be linked with the struggle to defend the life of Chairman Gonzalo, defend against all the other attacks on the rights of the many prisoners of war---and to support the continuing People's War.
The revolutionary sisters and brothers in Peru have been a source of great inspiration and strength for proletarians and oppressed people around the world. Now is the time for people everywhere to step up support for the comrades of the Communist Party of Peru and the People's War they are leading.
This article is posted in English and Spanish on Revolutionary Worker Online
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