Peruvian Police Fire on Minas Conga Opponents AGAIN

20th Sep­tem­ber 2013, Two pieces from the ongo­ing strug­gle to stop the Minas Con­ga gold mine in Peru.

First, from World War 4 Report:

Nation­al Police troops in Peru’s north­ern Caja­mar­ca province on Sept. 17 clashed with res­i­dents of Quishuar Cor­ral ham­let who were con­duct­ing reconas­siance of moun­tain trails on their com­mu­nal lands, which they sus­pect­ed the Yana­cocha min­ing com­pa­ny of ille­gal­ly clos­ing to facil­i­tate expan­sion of its oper­a­tions. Four of the vil­lagers were injured, and two hos­pi­tal­ized. Wit­ness­es said the police troops opened fire with­out warn­ing with rub­ber bul­lets and tear-gas can­nis­ters. (RPP, Sept. 17)

The clash took place as a nation­al Sum­mit of Peo­ples Affect­ed by Min­ing opened in the south­ern city of Are­quipa, attend­ed by over 200 rep­re­sen­ta­tives of campesino com­mu­ni­ties through­out Peru’s sier­ras. Among the head­lin­ing speak­ers was Wil­fre­do Saave­dra, leader of the Caja­mar­ca Envi­ron­men­tal Defense Front, who told a ral­ly gath­ered in the city’s Plaza de Armas: “Enough with our nat­ur­al resources being preyed upon and the envi­ron­ment of the coun­try being con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed!”  (La Repub­li­ca, Sept. 16)

Sec­ond, Upside Down World has pub­lished an arti­cle review­ing the his­to­ry of the fight against the mine, includ­ing an analy­sis of the ways in which Peru’s big min­ing push is intrin­si­cal­ly inter­twined with Peru and Brazil’s con­cur­rent push for more big hydro­elec­tric dams in the Ama­zon basin.