Chinese mining company Chinalco has gained rights to exploit copper at Peru's Mount Toromocho, to be used in electrification projects in China. The $3 billion project will entail the removal of the entire town of Morococha (Yauli province, Junín region). Residents voted to approve the relocation across the valley last year, on promises of government aid. But nearly half the residents supported a "no" campaign, rejecting the terms as inadequate. (BBC, June 17)

Colombia's coca crop grew by 27% last year, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported June 18, calling the increase "a surprise and a shock" given ongoing US-funded eradication efforts. Coca cultivation was also up 4% in Peru and 5% in Bolivia, the annual survey found.

In a June 13 statement, Ecuador's President Rafael Correa announced that his government has decided not to join the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), the integration initiative led by Venezuela. The statement said Ecuador would continue to pursue regional integration through the OAS and Union of South American Nations (UNASUR).

The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC) reports nine were injured June 13 when a unit of the National Police Mobile Anti-Riot Squad (ESMAD) attacked more than 300 indigenous protesters participating in a land occupation at Hacienda la Emperatriz, near the indigenous reserve of Huellas Caloto, Cauca department. The ONIC statement said the nine protesters were receiving medical attention at a clinic in Toez village, but the attack had not broken the occupation, and urgently called for intervention from human rights monitors.

Peru sent tanker ships carrying food and fuel June 13 to its southernmost coastal region of Tacna, where thousands of residents are stranded by a general strike over mining royalties in neighboring Moquegua region. More than 5,000 Moquegua residents have blocked roads, including the Panamerican highway, cutting off access to the Ilo smelter and Cuajone mine of Grupo Mexico's Southern Copper, the country's largest producer. They are demanding a greater share of profits for local governments in the region. Several provincial and district leaders have started a hunger strike in support of the campaign.

Police in Quito arrested three Colombians and one Ecuadoran in an alleged plot to assassinate President Rafael Correa. Two were arrested on the capital's Independence Plaza, where Carondelet presidential palace is located. The suspects were detained by agents of the elite Anti-Kidnapping Unit (UNASE), and had numerous photos of the palace and maps of the square. Ecuadorean Security Minister Gustavo Larrea told Caracol Radio the suspects were carrying weapons, but failed to say what kind. Spanish press agency EFE said one of the Colombians confessed to be from the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) paramilitary network. Prosecutor General Washington Pezantes said the men were being investigated for their links to armed groups. But Correa himself raised the possibility they are "simply scam-artists" (estafadores).

On his June 8 Sunday TV program, Alo Presidente, Venezeula's President Hugo Chávez called on Colombia's FARC guerillas to lay down arms, saying: "Guerilla warfare has passed from history, and you in the FARC should know one thing: you have been converted into an excuse for the empire to threaten us all, you are the perfect excuse. The day peace comes to Colombia, the empire will lose the principal excuse it has—terrorism." (El Universal, Mexico, June 9)

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro June 2 told reporters that US Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte—leading Washington's delegation to the 38th session of the Organization of American States general assembly in Medellín—is "a little official with a criminal record." Then, before the assembly, he accused Washington of sponsoring a campaign to "spread violence in the region." Maduro was reacting to Negroponte's remarks earlier that day that the Colombia's FARC guerillas "sought refuge in Venezuela." Without naming Venezuela, Negroponte asked Colombia's neighbors to help prevent guerillas from taking shelter on their soil. The US "categorically rejects" the Maduro's epithets, said US delegate to the OAS Héctor Morales. (El Universal, Caracas, June 3)