Daughter Called Activist, Not Terrorist U.S. Asks Peru To Try Berenson In Open Court

Lori Berenson made it clear from a young age that she wanted to be on the front lines in the war against injustice.

She volunteered at soup kitchens, chose summer jobs instead of summer camp, and as a teenager persuaded her family to adopt a foster child in Guatemala.

Whether it was her appearance in a television commercial for CARE or her work for human rights in Central America, Berenson’s actions have always been those of an activist, not a terrorist, say her friends and family.

Berenson, 26, was convicted of treason on Thursday by a secret military court in Peru. Her penalty for allegedly joining with a band of violent leftist guerrillas - life behind bars in a desolate Andes prison.

“The characterization of her as this militant, revolutionary leader doesn’t ring true to me,” said Martin Diskin, an anthropology professor for whom Berenson did research when she was a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “She was not a speechmaker and not a sloganeer. Very much the opposite. She was mild, even timid.”

Initially, Berenson - the daughter of two Ph.D.s - enrolled at MIT to study engineering and music.

But she increasingly immersed herself in the study of Latin American culture, including indigenous peoples in Mexico and Guatemala, the exploitation of agricultural workers in El Salvador and political and military turmoil in the region.

Tired of learning about Central America from textbooks, she dropped out of MIT in 1989 and went to work as a human rights activist in Nicaragua, then to El Salvador and, in 1994, to Peru.

When she came back in September to visit her family, she brought quinoa, a Peruvian grain, sang Peruvian folk and love songs and told upbeat stories about her travels.

She was arrested Nov. 30, 1995, and later charged with belonging to the pro-Cuban Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement, a leftist guerrilla movement which has bombed banks and kidnapped and killed civilians since taking up arms in 1984.

Police claim Berenson coordinated some of the rebels’ recent activity and helped them obtain weapons.

Berenson’s family denied the allegations and expressed shock at the severity of the sentence.

“This is outrageous! Lori is a pacifist, opposed to every form of violence, and has devoted her young life to helping the poor and oppressed,” said her father, Mark Berenson.

Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark is trying to help Berenson, and the U.S. State Department has called on Peru to try Berenson in open, civilian court.

A U.S.-Peruvian treaty allows American prisoners to request transfers to U.S. facilities, but Berenson has not given any indication she would do so.

In the meantime, her family is trying to figure out how to get food and warm clothing to the Yanamayo prison, a maximum-security prison for convicted rebels on a barren plateau in the Andes mountains, 12,000 feet above sea level.

Prisoners spend 23-1/2 hours a day in 6-1/2-by-10-foot cells. They have a toilet, a faucet with ice-cold running water and a concrete bench for a bed. The only electric light comes from the passageway. Most cells house two inmates.

“I’m numb,” said Berenson’s mother, Rhoda Berenson. “I wake up in the morning and I don’t even want to get out of bed. What I have to keep in mind is her strength.”