A ballet dancer in Peru who was caught hiding the leader of the Shining Path in her apartment in 1992 has been freed from prison after finishing her 25-year sentence.
Maritza Garrido Lecca, 52, emerged from a prison on the dusty outskirts of Lima smiling. As she stepped in a car, journalists shouted: "Do you regret it?"
Garrido Lecca is the latest in a wave of former militants to be freed, and their release has stirred fears of unrest.
Raised in an affluent Catholic home in Peru's capital Lima, Garrido Lecca stunned Peru when authorities discovered the country's most wanted man, Abimael Guzman, had been secretly living in the second story of her apartment above the studio where she taught ballet and modern dance.
Her story inspired the 2002 John Malkovich-directed film The Dancer Upstairs, that depicted the kind of patient detective work that led to Guzman's capture.
Guzman launched the Shining Path's attempt to overthrow the state in 1980 in what would become one of Latin America's deadliest internal conflicts.
An estimated 69,000 people were killed in the two-decade battle between state security forces and leftist insurgents. The majority of victims were the poor indigenous peasants whom Guzman hoped would embrace his plans for an armed rebellion.
After her arrest, Garrido Lecca denied being part of Shining Path's leadership but acknowledged having links to the group and shouted her allegiance to it before news cameras.
