Instituto de Defense Legal - Legal Defense Institute.
The mission of the Legal Defense Institute is to defend and promote human rights as a part of bringing peace to Peru and consolidating its democratic institutions. They work for the human rights of the people in their country and for peace. They also want to unify the democratic institutions, have active citizen participation and institute a rule of law. The organization has many reasons for their purposes. The IDL was founded in Peru in 1983 because of the emergence of general and permanent violence due to the Sendero Luminoso or Shining Path. .
The Shining Path is a radical political organization that used various terrorist methods against the government. In retaliation, the Peruvian government then started committing human rights violations against innocent citizens of Peru. The focus was mainly on farmers and people who lived in rural unpopulated areas of the country. Thousands of innocent people have been tortured, imprisoned, and murdered based upon assumptions made from the government. The IDL's goals are to maintain citizen security, public order, and proper police function.
The Legal Defense Institute uses a wide variety of methods to implement their plans. They use different legal and judicial activities. They offer legal defense and judicial information and counseling. They produce and propagate legislative proposals. They also send educational materials about their cause to judges, army and police forces, social organizations, academic audiences, and non-governmental organizations. .
They use education and communication activities for training citizens to be leaders for the cause in their communities. After these training seminars, participants conduct citizen campaigns to identify local concern and mobilize citizens to develop a common platform. Other means of education and communication are regional meetings, participation in the Peruvian Network in Education in Human Rights, and production of radio programs as educational material.