[www-features] PROPOSAL: Inter-American Court of Human Rights Affirms Lori Berenson's 20-year Sentence

[suzq at riseup.net]

HEADER: <a href="http://peru.indymedia.org/">PERU</A>: HUMAN RIGHTS

TITLE: Inter-American Court of Human Rights Affirms Lori Berenson's
20-year Sentence

IMAGE URL: http://www.freelori.org/art/limaportrait_small.jpg

BODY: On December 2, 2004 the Inter-American Court of Human Rights upheld
the conviction of Lori Berenson, an American journalist and human-rights
activist whose case has been championed by Amnesty International as well
as the UNHCR's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention.  Lori is currently
serving a 20-year prison sentence in Peru on charges of collaborating with
the Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Amaru.  In so doing, the Court
reversed the unanimous decision of the Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights which, on April 3, 2002, had declared that Lori's civilian trial
had violated her right to due process, that her rights under the American
Convention on Human Rights needed to be completely restored, that she be
compensated for her wrongful suffering, and that Peru bring its
anti-terrorism laws into compliance with the American Convention on Human
Rights. Indeed, the court's decision contradicted its own preliminary
decision as of November 10, which Monroy Galvez (the ad-hoc judge
representing Peru) stated had called for Lori's release.  The decision
followed two weeks of intense lobbying by Peruvian officials and does not
bode well for enforcement of international standards of human rights in
the future.

LINKS:
<a href="http://peru.indymedia.org">Indymedia Peru</a>
<a href="http://www.freelori.org">Committee to Free Lori Berenson</a>