NEW YORK TIMES – CARACAS, Venezuela — Peru’s Congress on Thursday overturned two decrees by President Alan García that were aimed at opening large areas of the Peruvian Amazon to logging, dams and oil drilling but set off protests by indigenous groups this month in which dozens died.

An Ashaninka indigenous woman cooked in the main road linking the central jungle to Lima.

The move appeared to ease tensions with the indigenous groups, which had continued with their protests and road blockades in parts of Peru despite Congress’s decision to suspend the decrees last month. After the vote on Thursday, however, some indigenous leaders said they would lift the scattered blockades and halt the protests.
“Today is a historic day for all indigenous people and for the nation of Peru,” said Daysi [Continue reading...]

The conflicts in Bagua these past couple of days were in response to an executive order which blocked any further legislation on a controversial decree. This decree basically opened up the Amazon to oil and lumber companies for exploitation, a move that the President of Peru, Alan Garcia has been planning since the signing of the Free Trade Agreement with the United States of America.
Alan Garcia’s Government has done a great job in alienating the Amazonian people, going as far as saying “These people aren’t first-class citizens who can say — 400,000 natives to 28 million Peruvians — ‘You don’t have the right to be here.’ No way. That is a huge error.” these are Garcia’s own words. Words of hate and words of what is now being called a [Continue reading...]