Six weeks ago, Peru’s Ministry of Energy and Mines announced that it was “indefinitely suspending” the exploration activities of a Canadian mining company inside the sacred territory of the Awajun and Wampis Peoples.
AMAZONIA FOR SALE
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The announcement was curiously timed just a few days before a new mobilization was supposed to be launched in the Amazon. In part, the mobilization was going to be aimed at the Canadian company, Minera Afrodita (Dorato Resources) , who is believed to be contaminating the Cenepa and Maranon rivers with mercury and cyanide waste. As many as 13 thousand indigenous people depend on these two rivers.
Nevertheless, the Awajun and Wampis couldn’t take the chance of ignoring the Ministry’s words. But as the days went by, it became clear to the Awajun and Wampis–along with the international community–that Peru had no intention of actually halting the company’s work.
Looking back now, February 17 was just another day in Peru’s legacy of betraying Indigenous Peoples.
A new report by ODECOFROC (the Organization for the Development of the Border Communities of El Cenepa), a group that represents 56 Awajun and Wampis communities reveals a number of other government betrayals central to the Indigenous Peoples’ territory. This is also the subject of a new film by ODECOFROC and the IWGIA (International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs) titled, Amazonia for Sale.
While the film provides viewers with an introduction to the Awajun and Wampis struggles, their 68-page report, A Chronicle of Deception, provides the details.
Most importantly, it demonstrates how “the Peruvian government acted in bad faith” by modifying the original proposal to create the Ichigkat Muja National Reserve and ultimately secure the Indigenous Peoples lands.
The proposal was supposed to include the area Minera Afrodita claims to own; that is what the Awajun and Wampis understood when they agreed to the proposal. However, the government unilaterally cut down the proposed protection area, specifically, but not exclusively, for Afrodita.
The betrayal was “in open violation of Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the American Convention on Human Rights,” says ODECOFROC.
Overall, ODECOFROC continues, “This situation serves as a basis for the claims made by the indigenous movement that led to massive demonstrations in 2008 and 2009, in addition to a prolonged strike, which culminated in the bloody events of Bagua (June 5, 2009), when the government violently intervened to evacuate the Awajun and Wampis contingents that had blocked a highway.”
Sadly, with the government’s continued push to gut the Amazon of it’s precious resources–and remove any communities in its way–there will be more protests and maybe even more bloodshed before the government finally agrees to act in good faith for all of Peru, South America and the world.
- Download “A Chronicle of Deception” at http://www.iwgia.org/sw40930.asp