Peru sends army to tackle Amazon 'insurgency'

Peru sends army to tackle Amazon 'insurgency'
By Richard Reynolds in Buenos Aires

Posted Sun May 17, 2009 7:36am AEST

The Peruvian government has sent troops into its Amazon region to quell protesting indigenous people.

The traditional natives are upset over growing plans to develop the region's natural resources.

The main groups representing the Indians of Eastern Peru have used words like 'insurgency' and some natives have begun to close roads and damage government facilities.

Some have promised more drastic action if the government does not scale back plans for mining, oil and gas exploration and timber operations.

Earlier in the week the government declared a state of emergency in the three states that border Brazil, suspending constitutional rights there.

The region is sparsely populated and mostly dense Amazonian jungle.

But the government has been building roads in recent years, some in areas that Peruvian law actually protects.

The army's mandate will initially only last for 30 days.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/05/17/2572673.htm?section=justin

Latin America forum:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=405

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Here's how they're spinning it elsewhere:

Page last updated at 01:05 GMT, Sunday, 17 May 2009 02:05 UK
Peru army call for Amazon protest

Peru's military have been authorised to give support to the police for 30 days in an escalating dispute over Amazon resources with indigenous groups.

The armed forces will intervene to ensure the operation of roads, airports and other essential services, Peru's ministry of defence said.

A day before the protestors said they would begin an insurgency to defend their rights, a threat later withdrawn.

Some 30,000 people have held a month-long protest in Peru's Amazon region.

There have been clashes with the police as the indigenous protesters call for the repeal of decrees passed over the last two years relaxing restrictions over oil exploration and development.

President Alan Garcia has said all Peruvians should benefit from the country's natural resources not just the "small group of people who live there".

"We have to understand when there are resources like oil, gas and timber, they don't belong only to the people who had the fortune to be born there," President Garcia said.

Under Peru's constitution the state is the owner of the country's mineral and hydrocarbon wealth.

Ancestral territories

On Friday, Alberto Pizango, head of the indigenous Amazonian organisation, AIDESEP, said talks with the government had broken down.

He said their ancestral territories were being handed over to multinational companies without consultation.

But he denied he or the movement of 65 indigenous groups he leads are against development.

"What we want is development from our perspective," Mr Pizango said.

On 8 May the government declared a state of emergency for 60 days in parts of Peru's Amazon region where the protestors have disrupted transportation links including airports and bridges.

Huge stakes are involved, says the BBC's Dan Collyns in Lima. Last month, a French oil company, Perenco, pledged to invest $2b (£1.32b) in one rainforest oil field.

Indigenous communities complain that some 70% of Peruvian Amazon territory is now leased for oil and gas exploration, putting at risk their own lives and the biodiversity of the Amazon.

The Peruvian rainforest is the biggest stretch of Amazon outside Brazil.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8054043.stm

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Peru dispatches army to quell indigenous protests

by Roberto Cortijo Roberto Cortijo – Sat May 16, 5:13 pm ET
LIMA (AFP) – Peru authorized the armed forces Saturday to back up police to quell indigenous groups' protests over Amazon land, oil and mineral rights, after protestors declared an insurgency against the government.

The Ministry of Defense in a decree said it "authorizes for 30 days the intervention of the armed forces to ensure the continued functioning of essential services in select districts" of five provinces in Peru's Amazon rainforest region.

The military said their involvement seeks to ensure the operation of roads and airports, and the supply of water and electricity.

Protests have erupted in response to government moves to open the region to oil exploration and development by foreign companies under a set of liberalizing decrees that President Alan Garcia signed in 2007 and 2008.

French oil company Perenco last month announced plans to invest more than two billion dollars to develop a field in the Maranon River basin in northeastern Peru, a measure of the stakes involved for the Garcia government.

Alberto Pizango, the leader of a movement of 65 indigenous groups, said they had agreed "to declare our peoples in insurgency against the government of President Alan Garcia in the indigenous Amazon territories.

"This means our ancestral laws will become obligatory laws, and we will regard as aggression any force that tries to enter our territory," he said.

His statement followed the government's May 8 declaration of a 60-day state of emergency in areas of the Amazon, suspending constitutional guarantees in an attempt to suppress protests, which have targeted airports, bridges and river traffic.

Talks between protest leaders and cabinet chief Yehude Simon in Lima Wednesday failed to defuse the conflict.

"The solution is to revoke those decrees," said Pizango. The decrees eased restrictions on oil and other forms development in territories claimed by indigenous groups.

"This is not a mere whim. The government has not consulted us. We are not against development even though we are portrayed as being against the system. What we want is development from our perspective," he said.

"The government wants to take our territory to give it to the big multinational companies. There are riches there like oil, wood, gold -- riches that arouse the ambitions of the world's wealthy," he said.

The indigenous groups on Tuesday gained the backing of the International Federation of Human Rights, which groups 155 human rights organizations from around the world. It called on Peru to rescind the decrees because of the government's failure to consult indigenous peoples.

Government officials acknowledge that the country's indigenous groups have historically been marginalized, but insist that Peru's constitution makes the state the owner of the country's mineral wealth.

"Undersoil resources do not belong to the indigenous people but to all Peruvians," Environment Minister Antonio Brack told reporters on Tuesday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090516/wl_afp/perunativerightsecology

and beating up on the indigenous? That's what he said. "The Peru 'free trade' deal is the kind I support."

It's worse than a raw deal for the people of Peru. It could well mean permanent injury or death for many--for the protesters and any other indigenous who happen to be around, and, possibly worst of all, in the long view that the indigenous take of things, the catastrophic loss of environmental integrity, due to mining, logging and other resource extraction.

I remember the bullshit that our Democrats spouted about the Peru "free trade" agreement with its so-called labor and environmental protections. Obama bought that bullshit, sad to say. We (those of us who try to keep informed) all knew it would come to this--use of the military against the indigenous and other violent repression--partly because of who is running the country--the extremely corrupt Bush crony Alan Garcia (who has an approval rating like Bush's, under 30%); the other part being: this is what the U.S. government does--it serves global corporate predators.

My heart, my thoughts, my prayers go out to the brave people of Peru who are making such a courageous stand against these creeps who rule the world. Bless them! And may Mother Earth protect them!

:grouphug:

Obama clearly does not understand Latin America, if he at all supports Peru's govt on this

"We have to understand when there are resources like oil, gas and timber, they don't belong only to the people who had the fortune to be born there"

Complaining as if he's the one being treated unfairly!

http://incakolanews.blogspot.com/2009/05/peru-amazon-indigenous-oil-situation.html">Inka Kola News