Statement on the Capture of Comrade Feliciano
The capture of Comrade Feliciano (Oscar Ramirez Durand) is painful for the
Revolutionary Internationalist Movement, and for all the world's Maoists,
revolutionaries and progressive people.
After the arrest of Communist Party of Peru Chairman Gonzalo in 1992, Comrade
Feliciano assumed the responsibility of leading the Central Committee of the
PCP through this "bend in the road". Since then the PCP has never faltered
in continuing the People's War, showing the highest courage and determination
in the face of the enemy, which has mounted repeated intensive military
campaigns against the People's Liberation Army. The Party has also persevered
despite the Right Opportunist Line that emerged from among the Party's ranks
which insists that the war be abandoned in the face of hard blows. This would
have meant abandoning the masses of people of Peru, who have always been the
source of the Party's strength and its ability to overcome twists and turns.
It would have also meant abandoning the cause of the exploited and oppressed
of the whole world. It has been the PCP Central Committee's steadfastness and
grasp of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism that has enabled it to find the ways to
continue to draw on the strength of the people and persist in leading the
People's War.
At this difficult moment for the revolution in Peru, it continues to be of
vital importance for our cause to draw on the strength of the people in
every country possible in support of the People's War in Peru. We call on
all those who can be united to oppose the criminal Fujimori regime that has
committed so many atrocities against the people and the revolutionaries,
including holding Chairman Gonzalo in total isolation for nearly seven
years, and to support the resistance of the heroic prisoners of war who are
holding out against torture, abuse, horrendous conditions and other forms of
pressure to force them to make peace with the U.S.-backed regime. At this
time, it is particularly important to oppose the Fujimori regime's efforts to
submit Comrade Feliciano to such treatment.
Committee of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement
15 July 1999
[This statement was inserted at the last minute into A World to Win,
#25 (1999) when it was printed.]