Peru renews state of emergency in several jungle provinces amid Shining Path reports

The government renewed a state of emergency Friday for 60 days in several isolated jungle and highland provinces amid reports of Maoist Shining Path guerrilla activity.

The measure went into effect with publication of a decree in the official government gazette, El Peruano, for the provinces of Huanta and La Mar in the Department of Ayacucho, the birthplace of the guerrilla insurgency. It also included isolated provinces in the departments of Huancavelic, Junin and northern Cuzco.

President Alejandro Toledo's Cabinet Chief Pedro Pablo Kuczynski warned in September about a Shining Path resurgence in Peru's countryside.

Under Peruvian law, a state of emergency suspends civil rights, such as the right to assembly, and gives police and the military sweeping powers to enter homes and conduct searches.

The Shining Path almost brought Peru's government to its knees in the 1980s and early 1990s with a campaign of massacres, political assassinations, bombings and sabotage, causing an estimated $22 billion in damage.

A government appointed truth commission reported in 2003 that the Shining Path was responsible for 54 percent of an estimated 69,280 deaths between 1980 and 2000.

The Shining Path's growing threat faded dramatically after the 1992 capture of its founder, Abimael Guzman, and in the last four years Peru has experienced political stability and sustained economic growth.

But rebel factions continue to operate in Peru's mountains and in the coca-growing jungle region, where several hundred guerrillas provide protection for cocaine traffickers, AP reported. V.A.