Shining Path Path snipers killed three police officers in the Ene Apurimac Valley. Shining Path The Communist Party of Peru - Shining Path (), more commonly known as the Shining Path (), is a communist revolutionary organization in Peru, espousing Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. When it first launched the internal conflict in Peru in 1980, its goal was to overthrow the state by guerrilla warfare and replace it with a "New Democracy". The Shining Path believed that by establishing a dictatorship of the proletariat, inducing a cultural revolution, and eventually sparking a world revolution, they could arrive at full communism. Their representatives stated that existing
Shining Path engaged in many human rights violations, which caused the Shining Path to appear in the eyes of many as the lesser of two evils. They used excessive force and killed many innocent civilians. Government forces destroyed villages and killed "campesinos" suspected of supporting the Shining Path. They eventually lessened the pace at which the armed forces committed atrocities such as massacres. Additionally, the state began the widespread use of intelligence agencies in its fight against the Shining Path. However, atrocities were committed by the National Intelligence Service and the Army Intelligence Service, notably the La Cantuta massacre and the Barrios