Peruvian President Dina Boluarte has blasted the Inter-American Court of Human Rights for its opposition to a recently passed bill that would grant amnesty to soldiers, police officers, and other security personnel involved in Peru’s internal conflict from 1985 to 2000. The court’s decision to seek the law’s suspension has been met with strong resistance from Boluarte, who asserts that the international court has overstepped its authority.
“We are not anyone’s colony,” Boluarte said, posting a snippet of her speech to social media. “And we will not allow the intervention of the Inter-American Court that intends to suspend a bill that seeks justice for members of our armed forces, our National Police and the self-defence committees that fought, risking their lives, against the insanity of terrorism.”
The amnesty law, which has been awaiting Boluarte’s approval since passing Peru’s Congress in July, has prompted international outcry. Critics argue that it would shield security forces from accountability for the atrocities that unfolded during Peru’s war, in which some 70,000 people were killed, mostly from rural and Indigenous communities.
International organisations have denounced the law as a step backwards for Peruvian society. Nine human rights experts with the United Nations signed a statement on July 17 expressing “alarm” at the bill’s passage through Congress. They called on the government of Peru to veto the bill.
“The proposed legislation would prevent the criminal prosecution and condemnation of individuals who committed gross human rights violations during Peru’s internal armed conflict,” they said. “It would put the State in clear breach of its obligations under international law.”
A week later, on July 24, the president of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, Nancy Hernandez Lopez, ordered Peru to “immediately suspend the processing” of the bill. She ruled that the legislation violated previous rulings against such amnesty laws in the country.
“If it is not suspended, the competent authorities refrain from enforcing this law,” she said. The court has previously found that amnesty laws and statutes of limitations are unlawful in the case of serious human rights violations like forced disappearances and extrajudicial executions.
The National Human Rights Coordinator, a coalition of humanitarian groups in Peru, estimates that the country’s latest amnesty law could overturn 156 convictions and disrupt more than 600 ongoing investigations. A previous amnesty law implemented in 1995, under then-President Alberto Fujimori, was later repealed.
Francisco Ochoa, a survivor of the Accomarca massacre, said that he and other survivors felt “outraged and betrayed” by the new amnesty law. “We will not allow the perpetrators of these crimes to go unpunished,” he said.
Despite the international criticism, President Boluarte has sought to frame her government’s actions as in line with international human rights standards. “We are defenders of human rights, of citizens,” she wrote on social media, while emphasising that her government was “free”, “sovereign” and “autonomous”, apparent jabs at the Inter-American Court’s decision.