resist environmental PERU "Peruvian President Alan Garcia marked World Environment Day by sending armed police to violently break up a protest by indigenous people seeking to stop the Amazon rainforests being sold to oil corporations and destroyed," reports Derek Wall. "We live in an upside down world where those who protect the environment are beaten, imprisoned and sometimes even shot, while official attempts to deal with climate change are used to reward banks and corporations." Derek Wall is a member of the Green Party and blogs at http://www.anothergreen-world.blogspot. com/ Peru: destruction On 5th June the Peruvian President Alan Garcia marked World Environment Day by sending armed police to violently break up a protest by indigenous people seeking to stop the Amazon rainforests being sold to oil corporations and destroyed. We live in an upside down world where those who protect the environment are beaten, imprisoned and sometimes even shot, while official attempts to deal with climate change are used to reward banks and corporations.
The present international framework to tackle climate change based on emissions trading has tailed to produce even the smallest cut in greenhouse gases but has created a market worth over a $100bn per annum. At the same time there is a global race to extract as much oil and coal as possible, those who object are silenced and in Peru if the indigenous get in the way they are expendable.
The indigenous people had blocked roads and river traffic in protest at new laws from President Alan Garcia, which would have allowed corporations to take their rainforest land for oil. Amazonians took part in similar protests last year to stop identical laws. On that occasion they succeeded, but the threat to their land returned. On June 5 at Bagua in the Amazonas region Garcia sent in heavily armed police to attack the indigenous people. Two days of violence ensued, resulting in at least 34 deaths and over 200 injuries. The unarmed protesters were fired upon, many who were injured were too afraid to seek medical help.
In Peru the indigenous organised into a powerful national network, the Intercultural Association of the Amazon (AIDESEP) which includes over fifty different ethnic groups have said "enough is enough" and are resisting further land seizures. The indigenous leader Santiago Manuin has stated "We felt that the laws annulled our existence. That's why we rose up."
Hugo Blanco, who publishes the newspaper Lucha Indigena, says that the indigenous practise an ecological lifestyle that maintains the biodiversity of the Amazon,
"They feel themselves at one with Mother Nature and deeply respect it. When they cultivate they do not grow a single product. Clearing a place in the forest, they plant avocado, pumpkin, bananas, maize, manioc and edible fruits together, imitating nature. After a period of time this place returns to nature and another place is opened for cultivation.
"They go out to hunt and gather, when they see something worthy of being hunted they do so, they go to their vegetable garden, if something is ripe they gather it, if they see that there is work to be done, they do it and they go home. You cannot say whether they are working or taking a walk. They drink water from rivers and streams and also eat fish.
"They live in collective huts. There are no 'parties' or elections; your social organisation is the community. It is not a boss who leads but the collective, the community. They have lived there for millennia before the
29 European invasion, millennia before the Constitution of the Peruvian State that never consulted them when drawing up its laws and which now attacks them with the aim of exterminating them." "Justice doesn't exist for the indigenous" The indigenous have used strictly non violent tactics to great effect, mobilising over large areas they have blockaded roads and rivers, actions which have punished the corporations and forced state. Garcia sent in heavily armed police to violent break up a blockade at Bagua on 5th June. Manuin, who was unarmed, was hit by at least four bullets. Rumours of his death led to 12 police being killed by indigenous people. The indigenous face heavy persecution, Manuin is to be arrested and put on trial as soon as he leaves hospital. While so far there have been no investigations by the Peruvian government into the killing of indigenous people, the full force of the Peruvian legal system is being used to criminalise indigenous protest.
According to Manuin "Justice doesn't exist for the indigenous. The government values the police more than us and doesn't want to acknowledge its mistake."
"It's very surprising that while there are criminal investigations against people accused of killing police, no one has been arrested or implicated for the abuses that led to the death of the indigenous protesters," said Susan Lee,
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30 from Amnesty International.
The Young Defenders of the Amazon, an indigenous environmental group, have recorded a long list of indigenous people who are still missing from the time of massacre. Independent investigators have also found a number of bodies.
The indigenous are politically sophisticated and highly organised, which is why Garcias government are desperate to criminalise their protest and imprison their leaders. Garcia narrowly won a run off election, beating the nationalist and pro-indigenous candidate Ollanta Humala in 2006.
Garcias Alianza Popular Revolucionaria Americana (APRA) was originally a social democratic party but has moved sharply to the right. Garcia's first term in office was marked by a wave of state sponsored killings. Along with Uribe in Colombia he is one of the few US aligned pro-corporate leaders in Latin America. As such he enjoys lavish support from the US, UK and the rest of the European Union.
Garcia aims to attract foreign corporations into Peru to create growth. Peru has signed a free trade agreement with the US, which allows for the removal of indigenous peoples collective property rights over the Amazon. Garcia is considered by many indigenous and their supporters to be a racist. In an October 2007 article 'El syndrome del perro del hortelano' (The case of the farmyard dog), he compares the indigenous people to dogs, an insult in any language. The dog, according to Garcia growls at anyone who threatens to take its bone, even though it doesn't make use of the bone. Garcia argues that the Amazon should be opened up to produce wealth for the whole of Peru but that the indigenous are selfishly opposed to development. Oil profits Manuin response is to say, "Look at history, what's happened to indigenous peoples, the deforestation, contaminated rivers. Is this development? We don't want this kind of development. Peru shouldn't want this kind of development. But we are never consulted.
They never tell us how they will ensure that our children can continue to live in the forest, how they will protect the forest. We need a kind of development that starts from the forest and is for the forest. It will also be the best for Peru."
The majority of Peruvians support the indigenous because they suspect that oil profits will flow to foreign companies rather than bringing real benefit to citizens. There have been many cases of bribery by corporate groups to allow them control over Peru's resources. Global protests The Indigenous are aware of the global importance of their struggle. They understand that the Amazon is a carbon sink that reduces the effects of climate change.
Their protests have had a huge impact. Garcia sacked the cabinet in the wake of the protests and Congress has repealed laws that would give access to the forests for corporate groups and the government have agreed to talks. However, uncontacted indigenous groups are threatened with oil exploration, 70% of the Amazon has been divided up for oil exploration. The government continue to criminalise indigenous protest rather than talking to indigenous people. More blockades from the indigenous look likely.
There have been global protests in support of the indigenous including a blockade of the Peruvian Embassy in London by the Climate Camp. The indigenous in Latin America demand our support and active solidarity.
It is worth remembering that in the movement across Latin America, the indigenous have been very much the cutting edge of the social movements. This has been especially true in Bolivia but in Honduras one the most
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active sectors opposing the coup has been the indigenous. The indigenous have also built alliances with the working class; the workers in Peru called a general strike in solidarity with the indigenous and in opposition to the free trade agreement with the US. The indigenous revolt in Peru has a double significance; it points to real action to protect the environment on the basis of ecosocialist principles and has already acted as a catalyst for wider social movements that is moving Peru to the left.
As Hugo Blanco has argued, 'the Amazon struggle must continue, demanding respect for the rain forest. The Amazonian natives know that what is at stake is their own survival. We hope that the world population becomes aware that they are fighting in defence of all humankind, the Amazon jungle is the lung of the planet?
During the 1960s Hugo led an uprising of Peruvian peasants who at the time were so oppressed they could even be branded by landowners.
31 He was jailed and threatened with execution, and only an international campaign of solidarity saved his life. He is acutely aware that indigenous leaders like Manuin are faced with similar persecution by the Peruvian state but can be supported by international solidarity.
All ecosocialists should make solidarity with the Peruvian indigenous a priority, they have certainly done more to fight climate change by opposing oil extraction and the destruction of forest than the entire Kyoto framework! II PHOTOS: below, left: devastated Amazonian rainforest below: the 5th June attack on indigenous protestors at Bagua, Amazonia right: the attack left 34 dead and over 200 injured