The ghosts of Peru's violent past return

This month, officials announced the discovery of a mass grave containing the victims of a massacre carried out by the military in the early 1980s - one of the early atrocities carried out during Peru’s violent two-decade struggle against a Maoist insurgency.

And authorities are concerned with reports of increased activity on the part of the remaining rebels who live in the high jungle and who are being funded by the illicit drug trade.

According to the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the conflict claimed almost 70,000 lives between 1980 and 2000. More than half of the deaths were attributed to the terrorist group Sendero Luminoso (or Shining Path) and a handful of smaller groups that emulated them.

But the remainder of the deaths and human rights abuses were attributable to the Peruvian authorities – most notably the military charged with cracking down on the violence.

Earlier this month, forensic scientists recovered the bodies of at least 60 people - including 15 children – near the village of Putis in the Southern highlands. At least 120 people are believed to have been slaughtered on December 13, 1984 by the Peruvian military who suspected them of collaborating with the insurgents. At least four other grave sites in the village have yet to be excavated.

According to the truth commission there are more than 4,000 mass graves hidden in different parts of the country. Over the past decade 505 bodies have been retrieved from mass graves in Peru, of which 269 have been identified, according to figures from the prosecutor's office.

The news comes as officials say attacks by the remnants of the insurgent force are increasing. Although only several hundred Sendero Luminoso loyalists remain out of the estimated 10,000 who belonged to the group at its peak, they have been well funded by the illicit drug trade and well protected in the remote Andean jungles.

Officials now say the group carries out an attack each week in the regions they control – usually against local authorities. Since 2005, at least 40 police officers have died in the ambushes. Last November a group of five dozen insurgents destroyed a police station and killed its commander in the mountain town of Ocobamba.