Sunday, June 21, 2009
Amazonian protesters win one in the end
Weeks of violent protests in Peru have ended after the government agreed to revoke two key elements of a free trade agreement with the United States that threatened to open up the country’s Amazonian forests to foreign oil and mineral interests. Indigenous groups are still unhappy with other parts of the United States–Peru Trade Promotion Agreement, leaving open the possibility of further political conflicts.
The U.S. and Peru signed the free trade pact December 8, 2005, and shortly thereafter, the first protests by small farmers erupted, followed by more demonstrations involving other groups that occurred in January of this year. While protests resulted in violence and four deaths in 2008, it wasn’t until this month that tensions reached dangerous levels. Media reports indicate Peruvian police attacked indigenous roadblocks and sit-ins in Bagua in northern Peru, killing about 60 protestors, including many shot by officers in hovering helicopters. The Peruvian government claimed that 24 police died in the violence, and that only nine civilians perished. Human rights groups allege hundreds of locals remain missing, and that police threw many bodies into rivers to hide the body count.
As a result of the mass protests involving hundreds of thousands in Peru’s rural regions, the national Congress voted 82-12 to repeal Legislative Decree 1090, the Forestry and Wildlife Law, and 1064, the reform to permit changes in agrarian land use without full prior consent.
Protests leaders have called off the demonstrations in the wake of the congressional repeals. But more battles could develop over seven other decrees that locals are upset with.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Victory in the Amazon (by Laura Carlsen, Huffington Post)
Peru Indians Hail 'Historic' Day (BBC News)
The United States - Peru Trade Promotion Agreement (Office of the U.S. Trade Representative)
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