“Now civil war!” chanted hundreds of people who marched through Lima on Monday as protests against President Dina Boluarte, which have already claimed 46 lives, continue unabated.
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Hundreds of demonstrators, many of them from the poor regions of the Andes, banged on the sidewalk downtown again last week, chanting “Dina murderer” or “Dina, the people deny you.”
Police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd, an AFP journalist noted.
Edmunda Canaguira, 60, arrived from Sicuani in the Cusco region last week. “We urgently need Dina to step down,” she said, traditionally dressed in a straw hat and colorful Andean-colored scarf.
“She Doesn’t Listen”
“We will demand until the last day that she resign. She doesn’t listen to people. We have been on the streets for a week with no food, no sleep.”
A large rally is to take place on Tuesday, to which several parties and unions have called. General Secretary of the General Confederation of Workers of Peru (CGTP), Geronimo Lopez, spoke of “a peaceful national mobilization”.
“We reject any act of violence and any action directed against public or private entities. Those causing chaos and destruction are people infiltrated by the government,” he said.
The demonstrators are demanding the resignation of President Dina Boluarte, the dissolution of parliament and the establishment of a constituent assembly.
The demonstrations “are continuing and we are working closely with the defense minister,” confirmed Interior Minister Vicente Romero this morning, while a state of emergency is in force in key regions of the country and protest movements are banned there.
He also believed that the country was witnessing “one of the highest levels of violence since the 1980s” and the armed conflict between the Peruvian authorities and the revolutionary guerrillas of the Shining Path and the Tupac Amaru revolutionary movement.
The minister again condemned the “financing of the demonstrations” by “a minority” who “does not show themselves” and pityed the approximately 540 police officers injured. Authorities have repeatedly accused protesters of being “manipulated” and funded by drug dealers and/or illegal mining.
He prided himself on police “professionalism” and defended police operations when criticized by civil society or abroad.
During the night from Sunday to Monday, the authorities released 192 of the 193 people arrested on Saturday at the University of San Marcos, where they were staying to take part in the demonstrations.
Machu Picchu closed
Several local media and civil society voices had denounced this controversial operation, which saw police officers storming the campus, conducting muscle searches and forcing protesters to lie face down on the ground.
The riots began on December 7 after the sacking and arrest of leftist President Pedro Castillo, who was accused of attempting a coup d’état to dissolve parliament preparing to oust him from power.
The crisis also reflects the wide rift between the capital and the impoverished provinces, which supported Native American President Castillo and saw his election as revenge for Lima’s contempt. Thousands of demonstrators from impoverished Andean regions turned out to demonstrate last week.
As of Monday, protesters were still blockading 83 stretches of road in eight of Peru’s 25 regions.
In the Ica region (about 350 km south of Lima), demonstrators attacked farms owned by major exporters.
The airports of Arequipa and Juliaca in the south of the country remained closed on Monday, their operator Aeropuertos Andinos del Peru said. Just like the tourist jewel Machu Picchu, which has not received any visitors since Saturday.
“The citadel is closed until this issue (the protests) is resolved. The railway line is broken, there is no way for tourists to get there. Now we only care about the preservation and preservation of the heritage that must not stop,” Zenobio Valencia, director of the Archaeological Park of Machu Picchu, told AFP.