Fujimori does have a case to answer

It is fortunate that John Laughland's forthcoming book on political trials ends with Saddam Hussein because on the evidence of his Comment piece ( Fujimori's trial could be truly historic - if he is acquitted, October 9) he has a poor understanding of Alberto Fujimori's trial or, indeed, of Peru's recent history. To claim that Fujimori "brought Peru's dirty civil war to an end" is to reproduce, uncritically, a discredited and inaccurate account of this period peddled by Fujimori and his associates.

The fact that "far more Maoist guerrillas were killed [under Alan García] than under Fujimori" is neither here nor there, since Fujimori is standing trial for human rights abuses linked to specific cases assiduously documented by Peru's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (the assassination by a death squad of a university professor and nine students is one of them), and not for the casualties that resulted from the war itself.

To suggest that Fujimori today faces trial simply because of the political manoeuvrings of Alejandro Toledo or that García stands to benefit in some way from the trial (when most Peruvian observers concur that, after Fujimori, García was the person who least wanted the Chilean supreme court to extradite the fugitive ex-president) points to Laughland's unfamiliarity with Peruvian politics. The fact that Chile's supreme court favoured extradition suggests the case against Fujimori is pretty strong.
Dr Paulo Drinot
University of Manchester
Dr Jelke Boesten
University of Leeds
Dr Patricia Oliart
University of Newcastle
Dr Gabriela Ramos
University of Cambridge
Dr John Crabtree
University of Oxford
Dr Lewis Taylor
University of Liverpool
Professor Penelope Harvey
University of Manchester