This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 LIMA 004842 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/10/2015 
TAGS: PGOV PREL KSUM PE
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL ADVISORS ON FUJIMORI, MARTIME 
BOUNDARY DISPUTE, AND DOMESTIC POLITICS 
 
Classified By: Political Counselor Alexander Margulies.  Reason:  1.4(b 
/d). 
 
---------- 
SUMMARY 
---------- 
 
¶1.  (C)  Top presidential political advisors Juan de la 
Puente and Juan Sheput, in recent meetings with Polcouns, 
addressed the principle political issues of the moment as 
follows: 
 
--  Ex-President Alberto Fujimori's extradition:  Peru will 
have a hard time preparing an adequate extradition request to 
Chile, but is determined to devote the necessary resources to 
achieve Fujimori's return for prosecution.  The extradition 
request will likely be limited to those charges linked to 
human rights abuses that would carry significant sentences. 
 
--  Maritime boundary dispute with Chile:  Peru was surprised 
by the vehement public Chilean reaction, but pleased at this 
development as it guaranteed passage of the new maritime 
boundaries law and provides the GOP with a chance of 
obtaining congressional ratification of the Law of the Sea 
Convention. 
 
--  Defeat in the decentralization referenda:  The public's 
overwhelming rejection of the decentralization referenda 
could have been a political disaster for the GOP, but the 
martime boundary dispute and then Fujimori's surprise return 
has consigned it to the dustbin.  National Decentralization 
Council head Luis Thais will stay on, and the GOP will seek 
to set the stage for a second and better prepared batch of 
referenda under its successor government in 2007. 
 
--  The 2006 presidential race should come down to either 
former Interim President Valentin Paniagua (Accion Popular), 
former President Alan Garcia (APRA) or Unidad Nacional 
alliance leader Lourdes Flores, with little chance at this 
stage for an outsider to make a surprise surge.  President 
Alejandro Toledo and his Peru Posible party have not 
finalized an election strategy, but both de la Puente and 
Sheput are urging that the ruling party offer its 
presidential candidacy to Alberto Borea, Peru's former 
Ambassador to the OAS and leader of the small Fuerza 
Democratica party.  END SUMMARY. 
 
¶2.  (U)  Polcouns met with President Toledo's Political 
Advisor Juan de la Puente on 11/9, and the day before lunched 
with one of Toledo's top unofficial political counselors, 
Juan Sheput.  The latter recently resigned as Labor Minister 
to maintain his eligibility to run for Congress in 2006, and 
remains one of the leading figures of Toledo's Peru Posible 
party.  Polcouns discussions with the presidential advisors 
focused on the most significant domestic political issues of 
the moment:  Fujimori's extradition from Chile, the maritime 
boundary dispute with Chile, the unsuccessful 
decentralization referenda and the 2006 general elections. 
 
----------------------- 
EXTRADITION OF FUJIMORI 
----------------------- 
 
¶3.  (C)  Sheput said that he has been advising Interior 
Minister Romulo Pizarro on preparing Peru's extradition 
request to Chile and was scheduled to be a part of Pizarro's 
high-level mission to Santiago, but was pulled at the last 
minute out of concern that his inclusion would lend a 
"political" character to the delegation (Ref A).  He 
characterized Peruvian extradition preparations as a mess, 
explaining that Ad Hoc Anti-Corruption State Attorney Antonio 
Maldonado means well, but is not in a position to follow up 
Peru's preventive detention request with the necessary 
air-tight extradition documentation within the 60-day window 
permitted under Peru's extradition treaty with Chile.  The 
GOP is looking at hiring top-notch private attorneys to 
review the evidence and assemble the cases, he added. 
 
¶4.  (C)  De la Puente agreed that Fujimori's sudden arrival 
in Santiago caught the GOP off-guard, and that the Ministry 
of Justice and Maldonado's team, even with outside support, 
will have to scramble to meet the 60-day deadline.  He added 
that the Government recognizes that Fujimori's extradition 
will have both political and legal aspects.  It is concerned 
that Chilean political and/or judicial authorities may seek 
to frustrate the extradition process, either out of pique 
over bilateral problems, such as the maritime border issue or 
the criminal proceedings against Chilean businessman 
Andronico Luksic, or because they have been suborned by 
Fujimori.  Consequently, de la Puente explained, the Peruvian 
extradition request will likely be limited to perhaps six or 
seven of the 21 criminal proceedings currently underway 
against the ex-President.  The prioritized cases, he 
continued, will focus on human rights violations carrying 
long prison terms, as this should enhance Chilean domestic 
political pressure on the Lagos Administration to extradite 
Fujimori, as well as avoid the danger of the Chilean courts 
approving Fujimori's extradition on minor charges, which 
would obviate Peruvian prosecution for other major criminal 
violations under the Rule of Speciality.  Cases that have a 
political aspect, de la Puente concluded, such as the charges 
that Fujimori subverted democracy by staging his 1992 
auto-coup, will not/not be included in the extradition 
request package. 
 
¶5.  (C)  Sheput indicated that the GOP is playing the human 
rights card on the political level by encouraging Peruvian 
human rights groups to lobby their Chilean counterparts to 
pressure the GOC to be forthcoming on Fujimori's extradition. 
 He hinted that the Government helped facilitate such 
contacts between local groups representing the family members 
of those killed in the La Cantuta and Barrios Altos massacre 
and Chilean human rights groups representing the family 
members of those killed during the Pinochet regime. 
¶6.  (C)  COMMENT:  Sheput's and de la Puente's concerns over 
Peru's extradition requests corroborates what we have heard 
from several other informed sources.  Former Ad Hoc 
Anti-Corruption State Attorney Luis Vargas Valdivia, during a 
10/4 meeting with Emboffs, predicted that the GOP would have 
a difficult time assembling convincing extradition cases 
against Fujimori.  He noted that Maldonado is a human rights 
lawyer, not a criminal specialist, and that in replacing 
almost all of Vargas' team he eliminated the office's 
institutional memory.  Since most of the cases against 
Fujimori involve tens of thousands of documents, testimony 
from hundreds of witnesses and complex linkages of financial 
transactions, it will take quite some time for Maldonado's 
appointees to come up to speed.  Our contacts at the Japanese 
Embassy have consistently told us that Peru's two extradition 
requests were ill-prepared, consisting of hundreds of 
documents that were not linked together in a well-organized 
fashion.  Javier Ciurliza, a member of Peru's legal team on 
the extradition, informed Poloff several months ago that he 
had been brought into the case to straighten out the 
extradition cases with Japan, and that he was appalled at the 
state of Peru's submission.  END COMMENT. 
 
----------------------------- 
THE MARITIME BOUNDARY DISPUTE 
----------------------------- 
 
¶7.  (C)  De la Puente said that the GOP was surprised by 
Chilean President Lagos' vehement public reaction to the new 
Peruvian law on its maritime boundaries (Ref B).  The Foreign 
Ministry, he explained, was prepared to receive complaints 
through diplomatic channels, and was taken aback when Chile 
filed its official protest before the measure was even 
considered by the full Peruvian Congress.  The Chilean 
response played into the GOP's domestic hand, however, as it 
precluded the opposition from raising objections to the law, 
ensured its passage by a resounding 98-0 vote, and won the 
GOP kudos from the media and nationalist circles.  The 
Government is hopeful, de la Puente added, that this spirit 
of unity will carry over into the debate on Peru's 
ratification of the Law of the Sea Convention, which has 
engendered significant opposition in the Congress, Armed 
Forces and ultra-nationalist circles who oppose converting 
the country's claim to a 200 mile territorial sea into a 200 
mile exclusive economic zone. 
 
------------------------------ 
THE DECENTRALIZATION REFERENDA 
------------------------------ 
 
¶8.  (C)  Sheput termed the public's overwhelming defeat of 
the decentralization referenda (Ref C) as a real defeat for 
the GOP.  He chiefly blamed National Decentralization Council 
(CND) head Luis Thais for the debacle, arguing that this 
position does not require a technocrat, but rather a 
political operator with expertise in conciliation who can 
hammer out compromise agreements that the political parties, 
central government and local governments can live with. 
Sheput noted that the opposition APRA party had effectively 
mobilized its cadres to torpedo the "yes" campaign in the 
north, a traditional APRA stronghold, as it could not take 
the chance that Lambayeque Regional President Yehude Simon, 
an independent, would dominate the proposed macro-region 
there.  On the other hand, he pointed out, APRA supported the 
"yes" vote in Arequipa (the only department which voted to 
join a macro-region) and Ayacucho, because it could expect 
that their Aprista regional presidents would dominate the 
proposed macro-regions. 
¶9.  (C)  De la Puente stated that the GOP feared the 
decentralization referenda vote could have become a 
"political disaster," but was saved by the maritime 
boundaries dispute with Chile and Fujimori's surprise 
arrival/arrest in Chile, which diverted media and opposition 
attention.  While the CND's Thais has submitted his 
resignation, he added, President Toledo was not inclined to 
accept it and would ask Thais to stay on.  The GOP recognized 
that  decentralization was now an issue for its successor, 
but would seek to garner consensus from the leading 
presidential hopefuls to cooperate in designing a new 
approach and aiming for better-prepared macro-region 
referenda proposals in 2007 (the next referenda are scheduled 
for 2009, but could be moved up by amending existing 
legislation). 
 
------------------ 
THE 2006 ELECTIONS 
------------------ 
 
¶10.  (C)  Sheput predicted that the 2006 presidential race 
will come down to a runoff between former presidents Garcia 
and Paniagua.  Garcia's APRA, he noted, has the best 
political organization in the country, as it again 
demonstrated in crushing the decentralization referenda. 
Panigua's Accion Popular, Sheput said, has a respectable 
political organization which will be supplemented by smaller 
leftist parties and civil society groups.  Furthermore, he 
argued, the center-left media can be expected to throw its 
support to Paniagua, attack Garcia, and ignore the other main 
candidate, Lourdes Flores, of the Unidad Nacional alliance. 
 
¶11.  (C)  While Flores is leading in the polls, Sheput 
discounted her chances of reaching the second round following 
the April 2006 vote.  Unlike APRA and Accion Popular, Flores' 
small Popular Christian Party (PCP) and its Unidad Nacional 
allies have minimal political organizations outside Lima and 
the major coastal urban centers.  Furthermore, APRA is 
pressuring her largest Unidad Nacional ally, Lima Mayor Luis 
Castaneda's National Solidarity party, to bolt the alliance 
through threats to bring corruption allegations against 
Castaneda.  In addition, Sheput claimed, APRA intends to 
raise questions about Flores sexual preferences (she is 
single), and will likely choose Susana Pinella (who heads an 
NGO that assists small enterprises) as its First Vice 
President nominee and have her show off her husband and three 
children at every opportunity as a visible contrast to 
Flores' solo status. 
 
¶12.  (C)  De la Puente was not so ready to write off Flores' 
presidential chances, stating that the GOP, prodded by Prime 
Minister Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, may be coming around to the 
conclusion that she is the candidate most likely to continue 
the Toledo Administration's policies and thus merits at least 
tacit support.  He, along with Sheput, was confident that the 
country will elect one of the three top contenders, rejecting 
the prospective "outsiders" in favor of an experienced 
politician.  De la Puente thought that ultra-nationalist 
Ollanta Humala had no/no chance to mount a serious 
presidential challenge, adding that the GOP was quietly 
encouraging the media to build up left-wing Congressman 
Javier Diez Canseco's Socialist Party to siphon off votes 
from the expected alliance between Humala and the far-left. 
 
 
¶13.  (C)  According to Sheput, Toledo's Peru Posible party is 
aiming to secure a 10 percent vote for its congressional 
candidates.  The "hard wing" ("ala dura") of the party had 
recently met, he confided, and had adopted the following 
strategy: 
 
--  wait until the last minute to nominate its presidential 
and congressional candidates to maintain suspense and 
minimize the time the media and opposition parties will have 
to attack the nominees; and 
 
--  discard most of the current Peru Posible congressional 
bloc, particularly the provincial legislators who have been 
almost impossible to control, as they have been completely 
discredited with the voters.  By waiting until the last 
minute to nominate the congressional list for 2006, the party 
expects to be better able to control these legislators, 
although it expects them to go into opposition as soon as 
they learn that they are not on the 2006 ballot. 
 
¶14.  (C)  Sheput and de la Puente said that they favored 
recruiting an independent to head Peru Posible's presidential 
ticket in 2006, and both cited Alberto Borea, until recently 
Peru's Ambassador to the OAS and head of the small Fuerza 
Democratica party, as their preferred choice.  They 
acknowledged that others in the party are pushing Vice 
President David Waisman and former Housing Minister Carlos 
Bruce for the honor, but, according to Sheput, while Waisman 
and Bruce have approval ratings over 30 percent, neither has 
demonstrated an abilility to translate this popularity into 
voting preference in the polls. 
STRUBLE