Peruvian prosecutors announced that they have found a mass grave in the Andes which contains 17 bodies.

Uncovered in the the Ayacucho region, the corpses are thought to belong to local farmers that were kidnapped by the Shining Path rebel group in the 1980s.

Although forensic experts say that without a doubt the 17 bodies were murder victims, it was not clear who was responsible for the actual killing.

According to the nation’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, nearly 70,000 people were killed in two decades of fighting between the Peruvian government and the Shining Path rebel group. As the BBC reports, Honorio Casallo Diaz, a Peruvian prosecutor, said that investigations by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hint that the dead farmers had been taken in the 1980s from the town of Vilcashuaman by members of the guerrilla group.

Kidnapping people as a means to increase their numbers is a typical move for the Shining Path. What remains unclear is whether the 17 farmers were killed by rebels or by the Peruvian military which is known for attacking people suspected of collaborating with the rebels.

The Shining Path was a huge problem for Peru in the 1980s and early '90s. The Maoist group was, for all practical purposes, defeated in the 1990s. Some active members are thought to be involved in the cocaine trade these days. The U.S. treasury department has in fact designated the Shining Path as a significant foreign narcotics trafficker.

As recently as April Peruvian President Ollanta Humala announced that 24 people suspected of ties to the Shining Path were arrested. The BBC reports Humala described them back in 2012 as "cold-blooded killers, who kidnap children, don't respect basic rights, and try to use terror and extortion to change the democratic nature of the country."

Bill Martin, a professor of political philosophy who has spent much time studying the Shining Path, describes them in a 1993 interview in the Chicago Reader as a very misunderstood group.

As Martin notes, they might not even be Maoist.

“The name ‘Shining Path’ comes from a book written in the 30s by Jose Carlos Mariategui (founder of the Communist Party of Peru) called Seven Interpretive Essays on Peruvian Reality: ‘The road to communism is a shining path,’" Martin said. "The book is pre-Mao, but it anticipates him."