(Updates with reaction from Garcia, lawyer for families) By Pav Jordan LIMA, Feb 9 (Reuters) - Peruvian President Alan Garcia was questioned by a judge for three hours on Friday about a 1986 prison massacre of leftist guerrilla suspects during his first term as president. More than 100 suspected Maoist guerrillas were killed at El Fronton, an island prison off the coast of Lima, when marines were sent in to quell an insurrection on June 19, 1986. "The president, when required to testify under any circumstances, does not hide," Garcia said after the session before a Lima judge. The killings by Peruvian armed forces trying to quell riots stirred up by Shining Path rebels was one of the darkest moments of Garcia's 1985-1990 term. He has been cleared of any wrongdoing in previous probes into the massacre and is not a target of this full judicial investigation ordered by Peru's top court. It was the 19th time Garcia has been questioned about the massacre and the first since he was elected to a second term as president last year. A lawyer for the families of those killed in the riot said Garcia again testified that he did not order the attack on El Fronton despite former cabinet members saying he did. "Garcia basically reiterated the statements he made a few years ago ... That, unfortunately, is contradicted by testimony from others in the case," said lawyer Carlos Rivero, who was present during Garcia's questioning. The president dismissed the criticism. "This is just a strategy to make the state look like the loser in the political war against the Shining Path," he said. Shining Path rebels led one of Latin America's bloodiest insurgencies in the 1980s and 1990s, but were finally defeated by the government of former President Alberto Fujimori.
