Protest Today in NYC Against Peru President Alan Garcia for his Human Rights and Environmental Abuses

New York activists will be joined by actress dancer Cynthia Paniagua to protest Peruvian president Alan Garcia as he attends the Council of the Americas Award Dinner in New York. 


The protest intends to denounce Garcia's human rights and environmental horrendous abuses in Peru. This protest is TODAY Wednesday, September 22, 2010 at 7PM in front of the Council of the Americas, located at 680 Park Avenue & 68th Street, in New York.

Photo AP - Graphic by Peruanista

Indigenous rights, trade justice, environmental, and animal rights activists, calling for the repeal of the US-Peru Free Trade Agreement will protest Peruvian President Alan García, as he is awarded the Gold Insigne by the Council of the Americas, an association of corporations backing NAFTA-style free trade agreements. The activists will be joined by Actress/Dancer Cynthia Paniagua, star of the film “Soy Andina.”

The Peruvian Amazon is threatened by mining, logging (much of it illegal), natural gas, oil, coal, cattle grazing, and plantation agriculture. As a result, wildlife species are being driven to extinction and indigenous communities are being displaced. Yet, instead of protecting his nation's unique and irreplaceable ecosystems and defending indigenous communities, Garcia has used the pretext of the US-Peru Free Trade Agreement to turn indigenous lands over to corporations and increase the rate of destruction for profit.

Nonviolent uprisings by farmers and indigenous peoples have met violent and deadly state repression, indigenous leaders have been driven into hiding, while the murder of community anti-mining activists has gone unpunished. So far, the government of Alan Garcia has killed 118 Peruvian civilians as a response to social uprisings since he took office in 2006, his second term.

Protest Peru President Alan Garcia

Wednesday 9/22/2010

7:00PM

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New York City is the largest municipal user of tropical rainforest wood in North America, primarily exported from Peru. Cumaru is now the rainforest wood of choice for the NYC Parks Department and much of the ipê being used in the city for municipal projects is from Peru. Environmentalists have been working years to ban tropical rainforest wood imports, but Government Pataki committed New York to a side agreement to the Peru Free Trade Agreement that limits a state's ability to set ethical selective purchasing standards and could open the door to a legal challenge of the ban by Peruvian wood exporters.

Rainforest logging, much of it illegal, has been directly linked to the murder and displacement of indigenous peoples, with recent reports of uncontacted communities near the Brazilian border being displaced by loggers.

"Rainforest loss is one of the major drivers of climate change. Mayor Bloomberg needs to immdiately end the use of tropical hardwoods by NYC municipal agencies to make good on his committment to reduce NYC's carbon footprint. 80% of the wood exported from Peru has been logged illegally, meaning that New York benches and boardwalks are made with contraband wood linked to human rights abuses and rainforest destruction."

According to Ana Maria Quispe of The Tiksi group, a NJ-based Peruvian community organization, "The so-called Council of the Americas, in reality is a lobby group for corporate polluters and human rights abusers, insults the Peruvian people by honoring Alan Garcia. Instead of recieving an award, Garcia should stand before the International Criminal Court for the atrocities he has committed against the people and environment of Peru. Garcia sold out our country with the US-Peru Free Trade Agreement, attempted to steal the lands of indigenous community for companies like Barrick Gold and FreePort McMoRan, and sent police to murder his own people for peacefully protecting their rights and their lands."

Peruvians protest Barrick in the Ancash region year after year with a regional 48 hour strike, supported by local politicians. The region is divided by Barrick's activities here and for the last two years, protesters have died in confrontations with the police during the strike.

Meanwhile, Barrick has reportedly employed many of these polices. Notorious for environmental and human rights violations in West Papua, mining company Freeport-McMoRan is pursuing a major extension of a copper mine amidst strikes by workers demanding fairer compensation.

Additional info at Trade Justice, Stop Peru FTA, and here. View photos of Peruvian wildlife.