Who are the guerrilla that puts Paraguay in check?
The Ejército del Pueblo Paraguayo operates since 2008.
The country is hacked by the Ejército del Pueblo Paraguayo, a paramilitary group composed by only 15 persons who has the whole population on the edge; President had to declare the state of siege in some zones and deploy a wide military operation.
The Ejército del Pueblo Paraguayo (EPP) says it was founded the 1st of March 2008, months before Lugo took office, in the city of Horqueta, in the north of the country, in the region of Concepción. Their first hit was 15 days after that, when they torched machinery used for agricultural work in a 20,000-hectare field of soy owned by a brazilian businessman.
That's how the group's ideology was presented, they claim to be marxist-leninist and seek to overthrow the government of Fernando Lugo, they consider him an "agent of the oligarchy", and say he doesn't makes a real agrarian reform. EPP is led by Manuel Cristaldo Mieres, Magna Meza, Osmar Martínez, Alcides Oviedo and Carmen Villalba; she [the last name] was the first to claim responsability for the guerrilla acts from prision, where she is serving a 19 year term for a kidnapping. Many of the conbatants were part of "Partido Patria Libre" [Free Homeland Party], and it is said that its members have ties with the FARC [Colombian narco-guerrilla].
In December 2008, EPP assaulted a military compound in Tacuatí, where they stole weapons and set it on fire. "We have to destroy everything and build a Socialist Republic from scratch, it is the only way to solve the country's problem", claimed Villalba from prision. The 29th of April 2009, a cleaning worker found a bomb in the Palace of Justice of Paraguay; she alerted the security staff, and they took it out of the building, where it exploded. EPP again claimed for the attempt.
The guerrilla group also kidnapped businessmen. The 31st of July 2008 they captured the cattle rancher Luis Alberto Lindstron: they freed him 43 days later, after a USD 300,000 ransom was paid. On 15th October 2009, another cattle rancher, FIdel Zavala Serrati was kidnapped in his ranch; EPP forced his family to donate meat to poor communities of the country, the rancher was freed 94 days later.
EPP still operating in the North of Paraguay, and has the potential to cause damage; though it has no more than 15 members, according to experts. That's why President Lugo decided to declare "state of exception" (state of siege) in five northern provinces for 30 days, to pave the way for military actions. "The main objective of the state of exception is to capture EPP members, who commited a series of horrible crimes in Paraguay", said the President in a press conference. He also supervised in person the deployment of 3,000 military personel and the police in Concepción, 500kms north of the capital city, to capture the guerrilla group, AFP news agency reported.
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