I was surprised to learn, while here in Peru, that the number of people "disappeared" in this country during the war between Abimael Guzmán´s "Shining Path" guerilla/terrorist organisation and the state during the 1980s and 1990s eclipses the total number of victims of Chile´s traitor - Pinochet - and the Argentine Dirty War, put together. Around 70,000 people are said by the Peruvian Commission for Truth and Reconciliation to have been killed, with about 15,000 bodies still missing according to EPAF and most of the victims said to be from the Ayacucho region in the Andes (where "Sendero Luminoso" or the Shining Path began). The events of the two decades are still being investigated and of course ex-president Alberto Fujimori is in jail for his part in ordering state organisations to disappear people alleged to be Shining Path members or sympathisers.
Today, disappearances in the Peruvian Andes hit the world news for another reason, when a gang were arrested in the possession of human fat. They have admitted to killing at least 5 people in order to sell the product through Italians to the cosmetics industry. I thought immediately of “Fight Club”, Chuck Palahniuk´s brilliant novel on American masculinity. However, it was claimed that their gang took their name – Los Pishtacos – from an Andean myth about a group of white foreigners who attacked people during the night to make soap and beauty creams from their fat. So, maybe Chuck Palahniuk looked south for his inspiration.
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