Truth, Reconciliation and Indigenous Rights in Peru: The Case of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Truth, Reconciliation and Indigenous Rights in Peru: The Case of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission

Summary/Abstract: This article presents the case of the Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission as both a milestone in the establishment of truth commissions and a representative case from the point of view of tackling, though indirectly, the Peruvian indigenous issue. Its proceedings, final report and recommendations aided in the improvement of indigenous rights protection. I argue that it was this mechanism that brought indigenous rights to the public eye, by presenting the violence, gross human rights violations and political, social and economic hardship suffered by these forgotten groups. The first part presents the conflict and the socio-economic context that ignited the violence, maintaining that it was precisely the marginalisation of the indigenous groups and ethnic discrimination that bred violence. The following two sections examine the achievements of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, its innovative elements in regards to prosecutorial action or reparations and its work towards justice and ethnic reconciliation. The conclusion draws on the ideas presented and outlines certain arguments in relation to the Peruvian experience in terms of acknowledging the official truth and reckoning it with the country‘s indigenous past and, more generally, to the importance of integrating and addressing indigenous rights in transitional justice mechanisms.

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