Shining Path "drastically and swiftly" to any violent action. In September that same year, a comprehensive sweep by police in five cities found 17 suspected members. According to the interior minister, eight of the arrested were school teachers and high-level school administrators. Despite these arrests, the Shining Path continued to exist in Peru. On December 22, 2005, the Shining Path ambushed a police patrol in the Huánuco region, killing eight. Later that day they wounded an additional two police officers. In response, then President Alejandro Toledo declared a state of emergency in Huánuco, and gave the police the power to search houses
Shining Path returned to the areas where the Shining Path had been active. Although the organization's numbers had lessened by 2003, a militant faction of the Shining Path called "Proseguir" ("Onward") continued to be active. On May 21, 2002, a car bomb exploded outside the U.S. embassy in Lima just before a visit by President George W. Bush. Nine people were killed and 30 were injured; the attack was determined to be the work of the Shining Path. On June 9, 2003, a Shining Path group attacked a camp in Ayacucho, and took 68 employees of the Argentinian company Techint and three