Peru Abandons Democratic and Human Rights Principles Days Before the OAS General Assembly

• Urgent call to OAS Member States, the IACHR, and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in light of Peru’s serious institutional crisis.

June 16, 2025 — Just days before the start of the Organization of American States (OAS) General Assembly, the Peruvian State is demonstrating, with alarming clarity, its disregard for two of the organization’s founding pillars: democracy and human rights.

In the past week, Peruvian governemnt entities have adopted, promoted, or announced decisions that seriously undermine these principles. On June 11, the Congress of the Republic approved a new amnesty bill—the second in less than a year—that would allow individuals responsible for grave human rights violations committed between 1980 and 2000 to go free, even those whose have been convicted and sentenced. This bill contravenes binding judgments of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and undermines decades of struggles for truth and justice. If enacted, the law could affect over 750 cases, including 156 with final judgments, directly impacting the rights of thousands of victims of extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances, torture, sexual violence, and massacres. According to the Court’s consistent jurisprudence, amnesty laws such as this one are de facto null and void and lack legal effect.

On June 12, the newly appointed President of the Council of Ministers Eduardo Arana Ysa made a deeply concerning statement before Congress, proposing that Peru reconsider its membership in the Inter-American Human Rights System (IAHRS). This threat to break away from the IAHRS puts at risk one of the most important international mechanisms for the protection of human rights currently available to Peruvian citizens. It also directly contradicts recent actions by the Peruvian government, such as nominating a Peruvian jurist to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and supporting the re-election of a Colombian jurist to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

These are not isolated events. They form part of a broader strategy aimed at dismantling accountability mechanisms, ensuring impunity for past crimes, and consolidating an authoritarian model that dangerously weakens the rule of law.

In this context, the undersigned organizations:

• Urge OAS Member States to express their concern and speak out firmly during the General Assembly’s dialogue spaces in response to the Peruvian State’s ongoing failure to uphold democratic and human rights principles.
• Call on the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) to take this situation into account when assessing the implementation of its previous recommendations and to consider including Peru in Chapter IV.B of its next annual report, reserved for countries experiencing serious human rights setbacks.
• Call on the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IA Court HR) to analyze and issue a statement on Peru’s repeated noncompliance with its rulings and to present this information to the OAS General Assembly.
• We reiterate our call on the Peruvian Congress and Executive Branch to immediately cease any initiative aimed at ensuring impunity and to return to a path of full respect for their international obligations on justice, human rights, and democracy through genuine, coherent engagement in multilateral spaces.

Peru cannot continue down a path of impunity and democratic backsliding without facing consequences in the inter-American system.

Signed by:

• Center for justice and International Law (CEJIL)
• Due Process of Law Foundation (DPLF)
• Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA)