In Mario Vargas Llosaâs 2016 novel The Neighbourhood, the regime of Alberto Fujimori, which ran Peru in the 1990s, is characterised as âauthoritarian, kleptomaniac, manipulative and criminalâ by one of its own apparatchiks.
That the countryâs Nobel laureate would write unsparingly about the sinister nature of the dictatorship is not surprising. Vargas Llosa, who lost a presidential election to Alberto in 1990, has been a trenchant critic of the Fujimori clan for over 30 years.
But in a sign of just how volatile Peruvian politics has become, an instability aggravated by a disastrous coronavirus epidemic, the author is now calling on Peruvians to vote for Albertoâs daughter Keiko in Sundayâs presidential election run-off. This is despite the fact she has vowed to free her father from jail, where he is serving a sentence for crimes against humanity, and is herself on trial for corruption.
These David Hockney drawings of life starting afresh are an uplifting antidote to the past year The 83-year-old artist s new exhibition, created during lockdown, offers hope to an injured world
about 6 hours ago Jonathan Jones
David Hockney: ‘I’m teaching the French how to paint Normandy.’ Photograph: Nathanael Turner/New York Times
“I think it looks terrific,” says David Hockney. “It’s all on one theme, isn’t it? And there’s not many exhibitions like that, really, a show all about the spring.”
The 83-year-old artist is taking a look around his new exhibition at the Royal Academy in London for the first time. He seems happy with it – and rightly so, for it is hypnotic and ravishing. But while I am getting a sneak preview in person, Hockney is here only virtually, his face appearing on two screens, one a giant TV, the other on a smal
In Peru, human rights advocates say police forces have been emboldened in part by a new âPolice Protection Lawâ passed in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic that backs officers who shoot on duty.
Peruâs new interim president Francisco Sagasti, a centrist who replaced Merino, has vowed there will be âno impunityâ for violent officers, and removed 18 senior police chiefs from duty in the wake of the protests, citing the need to âstrengthenâ the police.
No police officer has been charged or named as a potential suspect for actions relating to the protests.
Reuters TV footage filmed at the height of the protests in Lima showed how police fired tear gas without verbal warnings, aiming canisters either at body-height or at the sky, raising the risk of injury.