When former President Alberto Fujimori goes on trial tomorrow on charges of murder and kidnapping in his war against a Maoist insurgency, it will be an uncomfortable moment of truth for many Peruvians.
The harsh tactics his Government used to defeat the Shining Path guerrillas in the 1990swon Fujimori tremendous backing at the time. Now many Peruvians feel it is unfair to treat him as a criminal, while others are trying to reconcile their admiration for him with the long list of human rights abuses levelled against him.
"The trial is generating complex, ambivalent responses," said Jorge Bruce, a prominent psychoanalyst and commentator.
"Many people feel guilty about supporting him because on the one hand the evidence of the corruption in Fujimori's Government is overwhelming. But there exists this authoritarian tradition and people say, 'If everyone steals, why should Fujimori be any different? At least he freed us from terrorists."'
Seven years after he fled Peru in disgrace, Fujimori is now more popular than the present President, according to an opinion poll.
Prominent in the case against him are the 1992 death-squad slayings of nine students and a professor at La Cantuta University, and the 1991 killings of 15 people in a tenement in Lima's Barrios Altos neighbourhood.
If convicted of authorising the killings, he faces up to 30 years' jail and a fine of $43 million. Fujimori, 69, denies any involvement.
