Visits to the memorial will be suspended “until further notice” while complaints are made to police for the shooting of protesters
The mobilizations that have spread throughout Peru since December to demand the resignation of President Dina Boluarte, the closure of Congress and the call for elections have led the country to one of its bloodiest political crises. The number of registered fatalities during the protests rose to 60 this Saturday after health authorities confirmed the death in the southern region of Puno of a 62-year-old man who was seriously injured in clashes in which police used live ammunition.
Videos that have gone viral on social media show officers firing at the bodies of protesters in the main square of Ilave, a small town near Lake Titicaca on the Bolivian border. The repression by the police sparked the anger of residents, who in response set fire to the local police station on Saturday morning on a day when violence and riots repeated in the country and forced the citadel of Machu Picchu to close until further notice. and the Inca Trail, Peru’s two main tourist jewels.
“Faced with the current social situation in which our region and the country find themselves, the closure of the Inka Road Network and the Llaqta de Machu Picchu has been ordered, from January 21, 2023 until further notice, to ensure the safety of tourists and the population in general,” the official statement read. The measure was announced a day after train access to Machu Picchu, declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1983, was also blocked by protests, leading to the closure of Cuzco and Arequipa airports on Thursday.
The riots this Saturday also forced the suspension of operations at the Antapaccay mine, operated by the multinational company Glencore in the Cusco region following Friday’s attack by a group of protesters. According to the company, “vandals” entered the facilities to “loot worker and company property and set fire to parts of the camp.”
After the failure of the so-called ‘Toma de Lima’, the mobilization called to overthrow the government of Boluarte, the police arrested more than 200 people this Saturday after clearing the campus of the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, in the capital, where numerous protesters from different parts of Peru have been camping for days to join the protests. Footage on the internet shows how an armored vehicle with the help of riot police and a helicopter broke open the metal door to disperse the crowd.
While the government of Peru attributed the riots to a “coordinated and planned” action to promote certain political interests and “blackmail” power, the EU condemned the “disproportionate use of force” by the police. “We trust that national institutions will investigate and bring to justice those responsible for human rights violations or violations,” said European diplomatic chief Josep Borrell, expressing his dismay at “the sheer number of victims”.
Source: La Verdad
I am an experienced and passionate journalist with a strong track record in news website reporting. I specialize in technology coverage, breaking stories on the latest developments and trends from around the world. Working for Today Times Live has given me the opportunity to write thought-provoking pieces that have caught the attention of many readers.
