Clashes between law enforcement and protesters who attempted to seize the airport on January 9 left 18 dead, including a police officer who was burned alive.
Relatives of victims of state violence during mass mobilizations in Peru yesterday demanded “justice” from the government under President Dina Bolluarte, which they blame for at least 46 of the deaths in 50 days of protests.
“All I ask for is justice. I’m not asking for help because no one will bring my brother back to me again,” said Maria Samian, sister of doctor Marco Antonio Samian, who was killed in the protests in the mining town of Juliaca, near Puno, with tears in her eyes.
In this impoverished southern Andean region, clashes between law enforcement and protesters who tried to seize the airport on January 9 left 18 dead, including a police officer who was burned alive.
“Every day I feel like I’m dying too. I can’t live anymore,” Ms. Samian said during a press conference organized by the National Coordinating Committee for Human Rights (CNDDHH).
Her brother, a doctor, 31, was killed by a bullet while tending to the wounded during the street clashes in Houliaka.
The cities of Juliaca and Puno, more than 1,350 kilometers south of the capital Lima, turned into the theater of the most violent and deadliest demonstrations.
At the same time, in Lima, dozens of buses and hundreds of demonstrators were beginning to gather yesterday Thursday for a new mass mobilization.
Demonstrators chanted the slogan “Dina the killer!” holding placards and banners demanding the resignation of the head of state.
Mass protests and roadblocks across the country are now causing fuel and food shortages and have sent prices of basic goods skyrocketing.
After presenting a report titled “Fifty Days of Repression in Peru: Human Rights Violations,” the country’s national human rights coordinator called for an end to police brutality during the protests. Especially in the Andean regions, in the south, the poorest, where a large part of the population supports former president Pedro Castillo.
“We are experiencing unprecedented levels of repression in the Peruvian republic. “We are talking about 57 people who have been killed since Dina Bolwarte took office, among them 46 who were victims of extrajudicial killings by the police and the army,” lawyer Mar Peres told AFP.
Yesterday Thursday, the authorities counted 88 barricades that kept roads closed in 8 of the 25 regions of the country.
The blockades cause shortages of essential goods and fuel, for vehicles and household use. The main highway connecting the Andes to Lima is closed; hundreds of trucks are stranded.
The unrest in Peru erupted after leftist former President Castillo, accused of attempting a “coup” by announcing he was dissolving Congress as it prepared to impeach him, was suspended and arrested on December 7.
Ms. Boluarte, former president Pedro Castillo’s vice president until she succeeded him, is from the Andes and was elected with the same radical left party that ran as her predecessor. The protesters call her a “traitor”.
The crisis reflects the huge gap between the political and economic elite of the capital and the poor population of the provinces, where many support former president Castillo, whose election victory they saw as something of revenge for the disdain and racism of the elites, especially towards the aborigines.
RES-EMP
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