From: Luis Quispe 
Date: Fri, 22 Mar 1996 00:14:55 -0500 (EST)
Subject: SHAME ON THE SWEDISH GOVERNMENT!!

[From El Diario Internacional No. 28, March 1996.]
  SWEDISH GOVERNMENT DELIVERS PERUVIAN TO FUJIMORI'S DEATH SQUADS
                         RETURN FROM HELL

The title to this note is not from any movie. It belongs in real life, the
character is still alive and now lives in Stockholm (Sweden). He was a
victim of the reactionary policy being applied by Swedish authorities
against Peruvian seeking political asylum. This history, truthful and
dramatic, it itself shows how the Swedish government, which fancies
itself "democratic" that boast to uphold the "universal human rights,"
openly collaborates with the Peruvian regime, which is considered one
of the most brutal and abominable in South America.

Napoleon Aponte is a 32 year old Peruvian, graduated as an Industrial
Engineer in one of Moscow's most prestigious schools. In the first
months of 1994 he arrived in Sweden as a candidate for political
asylum. After finishing his studies and having remained 10 years
outside his country, he could not return to Peru because his family was
classified by Peruvian police as "sympathizers with Sendero." One of
Aponte's sisters died in the Canto Grande prison in 1992, when the
Peruvian regime murdered 100 political prisoners.

    Napoleon's odysee began in the first days of August 1994. The office
for refugee affairs presided by Ms. Berith Rolhen had summoned him
to "let him know the results of his application" for political asylum. But
the only results he was given were two husky policemen in civilian
clothes, who took him by the arm and led him to a cell, waiting for his
expulsion from the country. After being confined for 50 days in a jail
in Stockholm, he was shipped by plane to Peru. There Aponte would
be handed over to the bloody counterinsurgency police of the Fujimori
regime.

The plane landed in the "Jorge Chavez" airport in Lima. Three
Swedish police, a woman and two men, were charged with delivering
him directly to DINCOTE (National Direction Against Terrorism)
agents. For the last time he glanced the blond police who had escorted
him in the long air voyage. The woman was not able to evade the look
and smiled with a contemptuous grim before leaving with her
colleagues. "Now it's our turn," said in a hoarse and alcoholic voice
one of the Peruvian policemen.

             IN THE TEETH OF THE WOLF

    From the airport he was taken to the cells of the DINCOTE general
headquarters. His face was covered with a mask so he could not see the
streets. Right after he reached DINCOTE the tortures began. His arms
were tied behind his back and he was submerged repeatedly in a tub
filled with putrid water. He passed out and when he woke up he found
himself tied to a body in advanced state of decomposition and full of
worms. The stench from the corpse was untenable and he felt like
vomiting. He couldn't and then tried to cry out but could not do that
either.

>From DINCOTE, after 15 days, he was taken to the cells in the Palace
of Justice. There, Aponte tells us a new stage of his torment began.
The cells were flooded with dirty water and rats covered the floor like
a huge gray carpet. "From that sinister place I was taken to the Canto
Grande prison: the same prison where my sister had been murdered."

"I was locked up in a little cell, barely having space to sit down or
stretch myself with difficulty. I had to remain there all the time and
was allowed only 30 minutes every 24 hours to go out in the yard. The
food, if such can be called that, was sugared water for breakfast and
white rice and beans for lunch. That was all the food. Most of the
prisoners in Canto Grande have tuberculosis," Aponte tells us .

                        FACELESS COURT.

"Through a loudspeaker a distorsioned voice told Napoleon Aponte to
sit down. The room measured some 3 m x 6 m (10 ft x 20 ft) and had
no chair or bench on which to sit, so sitting could only be done on the
cold cement floor. This was the fearsome Military Tribunal. There the
judge as well as the prosecutor were anonymous. It's better known as
the "faceless court."

"Facing Napoleon Aponte was a large bullet-proof mirrored glass, on
which he could only see his own image, hiding also the faces of the
tribunal on the other side of the one-way mirror. Behind Napoleon was
a cement bench flanked by a symbolic defense lawyer, who was
prohibited from uttering a single word during the whole process."

The anonymous military prosecutor accused Aponte of "having caused
damages to the nation" and of being "responsible for an attempt with
bombs." 'Napoleon Aponte, who by now had become accustomed to
anything, remained calm while listening to all that, but had to ask to
himself: How can such thing about the bomb be true when I haven't
been to Peru in 10 years?

After three such meetings with the macabre "faceless court," Aponte
was exonerated of the charge of "ambassador of terrorism" and of
having "set off bombs." He had spent 100 days in Fujimori's inferno.
Aponte was freed on January 20, 1995. But his drama did not end
there. The government's counterinsurgency agents unleashed an all-out
persecution against him. He received death threats and had to leave
Peru again.

Now he is in Sweden again and justly reclaims to be granted political
asylum status. The case of Napoleon Aponte is an irrefutable sign of
what is happening in Sweden, where authorities resist to abide by
international laws protecting the right to asylum.

Editors Note: This text was reproduced, with some editing, from the
article Dick Emanuelsson published in the "Liberation" magazine of
June 23, 1995. Passages in quotation marks and most of the text shown
here come from the mentioned author.

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Translation and reproduction by
The New Flag: 30-08 Broadway,
Suite 159, NY, NY 11106, USA
E-Mail:lquispe@nyxfer.blythe.org
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