Seven Peruvian police officers were killed on Saturday (February 11th) in an ambush while traveling in an all-terrain vehicle in a coca plant-producing valley in southern Peru, the Peruvian National Police announced.
The attack took place in the La Convención province of the Cusco region, in a wide coca-producing valley known by the acronym VRAEM (Valley of the Apurímac, Ene and Mantaro rivers), where army forces have been fighting since decades of drug gangs and the last Maoist guerrilla militants of the Shining Path.
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“
We mourn the loss of our police brothers who were ambushed while riding in a police vehicle in the town of Natividad in VRAEM, where seven police officers died and one survived
,” police said. in a statement on Twitter.
In August 2022, the army claimed to have seriously injured the leader of the Shining Path Víctor Quispe Palomino, known as "
comrade José
", during an operation against "
terrorist camps
".
In January 2021, the army announced the death of number two of the Shining Path, "
comrade Raúl
", one of the most wanted men in Peru and brother of "
comrade José
".
Almost all of the Shining Path leaders are dead or detained, but there are still around 350 guerrillas in the mountainous areas, including 80 armed fighters.
The Shining Path, which launched an armed insurrection in 1980, clashed for decades with armed forces in a conflict that left 69,000 dead and missing according to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.