Amnesty International called on Peru's authorities to ensure that all those suspected of criminal responsibility in the Bagua violence are brought to justice, in a statement issued June 5, the fifth anniversary of the incident that left 33 people dead. Demonstrators and police were killed when troops fired on a road blockade launched to protest against a series of laws allowing for the exploitation of natural resources on indigenous lands. During the violence, 23 National Police officers were killed, along with 10 civilians. Hundreds more were injured. So far only protesters have been brought to trial. "If the Peruvian authorities are truly committed to bringing to justice those suspected of criminal responsibility for these deaths, it is not enough to punish the protesters and ignore possible abuses by the police," said Guadalupe Marengo, Amnesty's Americas deputy program director.

Peru's Ministry of Justice said in a statement May 8 that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), a body of the Organization of American States (OAS), has rejected a request from activists to recommend revoking the license for the controversial Conga open-pit gold mine in Cajamarca region. But the ministry's statement was immediately refuted by Zulma Villa Vílchez, attorney for the activists. Villa Vílchez asserted that the IACHR had not ruled on the Conga license, but had only issued a determination on another matter related to the conflict around the project—ordering Peru's government to provide protection for local residents, including the Chaupe family, which is in a land conflict with the mining company and facing threats. Said Villa Vílchez: "This injunction must not be confused with the petition we have made before the IACHR to stop the Conga project; they are two different things. On the latter, there has still not been a pronouncement." The case was brought by the Central Única Nacional de Rondas Campesinas (CUNARC), a body representing Peru's peasant self-defense patrols, which have emerged as the backbone of resistance movements to mineral development projects. (La Republica, May 9; Reuters, Caballero Verde, Cajamarca, May 8)

A new report issued by Peruvian NGO Environmental and Natural Resrouces Law (DAR) counts 412 hydro-electric dams to be built across the Amazon basin and its headwaters if current plans go ahead, potentially leading to the "end of free-flowing rivers" and contributing to "ecosystem collapse." Of the 412 dams already in operation, under construction or proposed, 256 are in Brazil, 77 in Peru, 55 in Ecuador, 14 in Bolivia, six in Venezuela, two in Guyana, and one each in Colombia, French Guyana and Surinam, said anthropologist Paul Little at the launch of the English version of the report, "Mega-Development Projects in Amazonia: A Geopolitical and Socioenvironmental Primer." (PDF). The report finds: "This new wave of dam building in the headwaters of the Basin is a 'hydrological experiment' of continental proportions, yet little is known scientifically of pan-Amazonian hydrological dynamics, creating the risk of provoking irreversible changes in rivers." (The Guardian's Andes to the Amazon blog, May 6)

In a move being openly portrayed as part of a race with the US-backed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) for hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region, China has set up a working group to study the feasibility of a Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP). The proposal comes ahead of a meeting in May of trade ministers from the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, which China will host. Wang Shouwen, an assistant commerce minister, assured: "We think there will be no conflict between the FTAAP and the region's other FTAs under discussion." But reports note that the news comes just as progress of the TPP has snagged over Japanese insistence on protecting its agricultural and automotive sectors. Chinese President Xi Jinping in October said at the APEC business forum in Indonesia that Beijing will "commit itself to building a trans-Pacific regional cooperation framework that benefits all parties"—an obvious veiled criticism of the TPP. (Tax News, May 5; AFP, April 30)

Spontaneous protests broke out in the town of Celendín, in the highlands of Peru's Cajamarca region, after the April 8 arrest at a National Police road checkpoint of six members of the "Guardians of the Lagunas," the campesino vigilance committee that has established an encampement to protect lakes threatened by the Conga gold mine project. The six, stopped on their way to the encampement, were charged with "crimes against the public peace" and illegal bearing of arms. They were removed from the region to the coastal city of Chiclayo, where they continue to be held. Among the detained is Fredy García Becerra, mayoral candidate for the local municipal district of Huasmín with the Frente Amplio party. (Celendin Libre, April 11; La Republica, April 10; Celendin Libre, April 9; Celendin Libre, April 8)

Emilio Marichi Huansi, the apu or traditional chief of the indigenous Shawi community of Santa Rosa de Alto Shambira (Pongo de Cainarachi district, Lamas province, San Martín region), was assassinated April 5—two days before the opening a meeting of apus that had been called by the Shawi Regional Federation of San Martín (FERISHAM) to discuss the process of demarcating and titling the group's ancestral territories. FERISHAM said in a statement that he was killed by sicarios (hitmen) and that he had received threats from local "mafias" and "traffickers in land" who oppose the process of demarcation. (Kaos en La Red, April 12; Servindi, April 10)

Peru's President Ollanta Humala on April 10 announced that a special police operation has resulted in the arrest of 24 operatives of the Sendero Luminoso guerilla movement. Speaking from Canada, where he was on an official visit, Humala said the detained were leaders of the Movement for Amnesty and Fundamental Rights (MOVADEF), which advocates for prisoners held in connection with the guerilla movement. The operation, dubbed Perseo 2014, coordinated armed forces and National Police units, netting arrests in Lima and five other regions of the country. Among the detained are MOVADEF co-founders Alfredo Crespo and Manuel Fajardo, both attorneys who defended imprisoned Sendero leader Abimael Guzmán. Local media in Peru reported that also among the detained was Walter Humala, a popular folksinger and cousin of the president, who has declared himself an admirer of Guzmán. Authorities said they had proof that MOVADEF is an organ of the guerilla movement, with a police source saying that Crespo went by the code-name "Lucas" in his dealings with Sendero leaders, and Fajardo by the nom de guerre "Bartolo." (EFE, Perú21, April 10)

Peru's Energy and Mines Minister Eleodoro Mayorga said March 25 that the government is working on a package of reforms to speed up permitting for investments, including exempting some oil exploration projects from environmental impact studies. Mayorga, a former World Bank petroleum economist who became President Ollanta Humala's third energy minister in a cabinet reshuffle last month, said: "An environmental impact study makes sense when there's a serious impact and we're working in a delicate region. But there's no need to do an environmental impact study for everything. That's the problem. At this time there is the need to review this through a new regulation." He added: "Very few countries demand environmental impact studies for seismic activities." (Reuters, El Comercio, March 26)