Killed for protecting their land from mining
OnJune 5th, World Environment Day, Peruvian security forces killed at
least two dozen indigenous people protesting to protect their lands
around Bagua in the Peruvian Amazon. In the violence, nine policemen
perished as well. The protesters were opposing the Peruvian
government's opening of the region to oil and gas drilling and mining
-- supposedly conditions of the Peru-US trade agreement.
Land will continue to be an issue and cause of conflict as long as we continue owning it according to imaginary money value which denies the natives usage of their ancestral inheritance, rendering them poor and beggars in their own land.