Since last month, Peru declared a state of emergency on the border with Colombia. For the United States Department, the measure is not enough

On July 16, the Government of Peru initiated the state of emergency for 60 days in the border department of Loreto, in the north of the country, which covers the border region with Colombia. The decision was made because of the possible presence of dissidence of the FARC in the Inca country, the declared territory is the largest department in Peru. The state of emergency means that "the constitutional rights related to personal liberty and security, the inviolability of domicile and the freedom of assembly and transit in the territory are suspended," according to the Peruvian Constitution.

Leer en español: Perú: ¿Es el estado de excepción la solución a la violencia en la frontera?

During the 60 days, the National Police of Peru (PNP) will be the one who takes control of the internal order, relying on the military forces. This with the aim of reducing the guerrilla presence in the country. However, and according to what military sources say to the newspaper El Comercio, the objective is also to fight against drug trafficking. It is in this department, Loreto, where the largest quantity of narcotics are sold between the two countries. For the government of Martin Vizcarra, the measure is taken, taking IGNORE INTO account that in that department the guerrilla group Sendero Luminoso had its operations center, and should avoid a resurgence of this.

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The Department of State of the United States, according to its latest report on illicit crops, assures that Colombia and Peru are still two of the countries with the highest production of narcotics. However, in the case of Peru they say that measures such as the state of emergency have already been taken before and that they have been ineffective.

The director of the Center of Studies in Security and Peace of Colombia, Néstor Rosanía, told El Tiempo, that the state absence is a constant in these border regions and that in the case of Peru can not be resolved from one day to the next. "The State has only reached the main cities; then, if the State does not appear and what is produced regionally is cocaine, so it is thought that the armed groups disappear, really new ones are emerging," says Rosanía, hinting at the possible sources of dissent of the FARC that have a presence in Peru.

Peru does not want to repeat the story

The Sendero Luminoso group, according to official figures of the Ministry of Defense of Peru, was dismantled at the end of the 20th century, after two decades. The figures handled by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Peru are 69,000 victims of the armed conflict. The fear for the current president is that the presence of groups outside the law on the border promotes the rebirth of attacks on the civilian population and the escalation of violence.

For Rosanía, the Sendero Luminoso group already has new factions, and like Colombian guerrilla groups, they are financed through drug trafficking. Rosanía explains that they are winning the population "building schools, health posts and soccer spaces, which has reinforced them and that with drug trafficking grow."

Carlos Malamud of the Elcano Royal Institute of International and Strategic Studies, opposes the proposal by Rosanía and assures that the actions of Peru, and its central government, have nothing to do with the Sendero Luminoso group, but simply seek to corner the dissidence

Malamud refers to the Binational Border Security Plan that was signed between Colombia and Peru in 2011, with which it is intended to work together to eliminate public order problems in the region. For Malamud, that security plan has to be implemented in a more rigorous way, because when it was signed, there was talk of shielding the border. However, today for the Elcano Institute, border security problems persist and only collective work can improve results.

Rosanía and Malamud agree that the presence of dissidence of the FARC in the neighboring countries of Colombia, requires full attention from the national authorities and a simultaneous work so that there can be no propagation of these groups in other countries. For these experts, memoranda of understanding between the two countries, and binational commissions to persuade the security issue, must be taken IGNORE INTO account. From this point of view, only a rapprochement of the countries on the subject can yield positive results in the fight against crime and drug trafficking.

LatinAmerican Post | Carlos Eduardo Gómez Avella

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