Andes, Latin America: Week in Review, Peru
Death Toll Rises In Peru Mining Protests
July 6, 2012 By Staff
Top Story— The state of emergency in Peru’s Cajamarca province continued Wednesday after another civilian was killed in protests over the $4.8 billion Conga mining project. On Tuesday, Peruvian Justice Minister Juan Jimenez declared a state of emergency in three of Peru’s northern provinces after thousands of protesters seized a municipal building in the town of Celendin and three civilians were killed, two apparently shot dead. Protesters fear that the mining project, whose majority owner is the Colorado-based Newmont Mining Co., will contaminate their water supply. Peruvian president Ollanta Humala has said that the government will replace four reservoirs that will be destroyed during construction, but this has not appeased protesters. Meanwhile, former Roman Catholic priest and protest leader Marco Arana was detained on Wednesday, and said he was beaten by police who took him into custody.
Read more from the Chicago Tribune.
Headlines from the Western Hemisphere
North America
- Mexican voting officials will recount more than half of the country’s ballots after Sunday’s elections due to apparent inconsistencies.
- A father and son in south Texas were charged with assault on a federal officer after allegedly shooting an ICE agent on Tuesday.
- Mexican authorities will attempt to recreate a Texas trucker’s apparent wrong turn into Mexico with a truck full of ammunition in order to determine whether or not he was smuggling it.
Caribbean
- A Dominican student group says that police shot and injured three student protesters at the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo on Tuesday.
- One man died and another remains missing after a boating accident in Puerto Rico on the 4th of July.
- Jamaican police detained three people, including a 16 year-old girl, for suspected involvement in the killing of three security guards last week.
- The Cuban government’s ban on rock climbing has taken a heavy toll on tourism in the Valle de Viñales, known for its karstic limestone cliffs.
Central America
- The Guatemalan government indicated that it would move forward with a plan opposed by mining companies that would give the state a 40 percent stake in new mining projects.
- A U.S. war veteran filming a promotional video in Guatemala was killed in a freak accident Monday when a tree limb broke and fell on him.
- The U.S. government denied Salvadoran reporter Mario Guevara’s application for asylum and has ordered him to return to El Salvador within 60 days.
- The Honduran health ministry said that 10 people have died from drinking adulterated liquor spiked with methanol.
Andes
- Members of the Quechua community of Mallku Khota in Bolivia have detained five employees of a Canadian mining company South American Silver.
- Former Colombian security chief Mauricio Santoyo Velasco waived his right to a detention hearing in the U.S. on Thursday for his alleged acceptance of bribes from drug gangs.
- Chevron’s spokesman for Latin America said the company may never reach a settlement with Ecuadorean plaintiffs who won $18.2 billion in damages for the contamination of their land by Texaco.
Southern Cone
- Paraguay’s new government withdrew its ambassador from Caracas on Wednesday after accusing Venezuela of meddling in Paraguay’s internal affairs.
- An Argentine court is expected to deliver a verdict on whether former dictators Jorge Videla and Reynaldo Bignone are responsible for the theft of 34 babies born to political prisoners during the country’s 1976-1983 dictatorship.
- Deceased Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet’s will was unsealed on Wednesday, but gave no clues as to his wealth.
- At least eleven people were killed when a trailer came unhinged from a truck and crashed into a bus in southern Chile.
Image: C-Monster @ Flickr.
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