Well ,as sad as it is , that's the way things work down there. If you're flying with your Cessna/Piper or whatever fits into the "drug smuggler" category and do not respond to radio contact and signals ,you're as good as dead. They will shot you out of the skies without much of a trouble. Not only in Peru that sort of things happens. All the region that includes the borders of Brazil/Colombia/Peru/Venezuela is an extreme hot place. It happens more often than most people up here think. A lot more... but somehow this made it through the world news.
I once was at an airfield were they ferried in an AeroComander that was apreheended two days before in a farm doing drug runs. The plane was fitted with an extra tank (really a big rubber- or something alike - bag )that gave the plane more than 12 Hrs of flight time!! And they flow it all the way down from Colombia. They were caught only because one engine refused to start during the invasion (of the farm by the police). Now ,do you think if this plane was spotted one day over some distant place and refused to respond to the interceptors, that he would stay airborne for long? Think and get your own conclusion.
There is war in those places ,against the drugs ,and like in any war...sometimes innocent people pay the price too (unfortunatelly).
[This message has been edited by AeroBoero (edited 22 April 2001).]