In Solidarity with Peru’s Oppressed Indigenous People

This Monday, people throghout the world came together at Peru’s consulates and embassies demanding an end to the systematic genocide of Peru’s indigenous populations. This tragedy was brought about by the disastrous “Peru Trade Promotion Agreement” which stripped land rights from indigenous communities and opened them up for foreign investment resulting in widespread oil and gas drilling and logging.

Iternational trade treaties should be targets of groups working on international climate mitigation. As we have seen when Mexico signed on to NAFTA, free trade agreements export our unsustainable lifestyle, drive (mostly indigenous) coummunities into poverty, and deepen the destruction of previously protected ecosystems. All of these problems contribute to the rise in greenhouse gas emissions and destroy precious cultural know-how that has the potential to guide us to implement more sustainable versions of development.

Many groups and journalists showed up at the Washington D.C. protest (organized by Amazon Watch) including the Energy Action Coalition, Campus Progress, Friends of the Earth and the Quixote Center.

Check out this video about the protest in Washington D.C. and make sure to leave comments with links to media from protests you attended!

Tommaso Boggia is the Climate Advocacy Associate at Campus Progress. Check out his other blog posts about the American Clean Energy And Security Act on FundingourFuture.campusprogress.org

About Tommaso

Until recently, Tommaso Boggia was the Climate Advocacy Associate at Campus Progress, the Center for American Progress youth outreach program. Prior to joining the Center, Tommaso was the Sustainability Event Coordinator for his alma mater, UC Santa Cruz, where he received a degree in Sociology with an emphasis in environmental justice. He led numerous climate change campaigns on his campus, including one to offset 100% of UC Santa Cruz’s energy use and others implementing energy efficiency programs saving UC Santa Cruz over $30,000 in utility costs. Tommaso has worked extensively with student groups, including the California Public Interest Research Group, the Alliance to Save Energy's Green Campus Program, and the California Student Sustainability Coalition. When he's not working to make the world a greener place, Tommaso can be found riding around town on his Gary Fischer bicycle that gets infinity miles per gallon.

3 Responses to “In Solidarity with Peru’s Oppressed Indigenous People”

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1 njmagel Jun 10th, 2009 at 7:20 pm

Thank you for the Post. Its great to see how fast folks in the US organized so fast around this violence. great to see this on IGHH because of the deep ties to climate change and resource exploatation.

In some breaking news: inroads are being made in Peru. The disputed decrees have been temporarly suspended. Far from justice, but good news none the the less.

http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN1046335520090610
2 Umar Badarsyah Jun 10th, 2009 at 9:35 pm

Isn’t Peru party to ILO Convention 169? How Free Trade Laws prevail over human rights law is totally unacceptable, and worth to fight against. My heart and prayers for all the fighting indigenous peoples. From Indonesia with love and spirit.
3 Root Force Jun 11th, 2009 at 4:23 pm

Actually, only 2 of the 10 laws being targeted have been temporarily suspended. This is rightly seen by many indigenous protesters as an attempt to distract them so that the government can mobilize to regain its footing.

Solidarity actions are still important, as are letters to Peruvian government officials demanding an end to the violence and an outright repeal of all the contested free trade laws; and letters to US and international officials demanding that they pressure the Peruvian government to bring an end to the crisis.

The Peruvian government is on the defensive and a sustained international push, combined with the intense domestic turmoil they are already facing, could force them to back down.

It’s also worth noting that among the contested laws are some that would greatly increase the pace of oil and gas drilling in the Amazon, not to mention deforestation for biofuel plantations.

http://www.rootforce.org/2009/06/10/upcoming-peru-solidarity-protests/
http://www.rootforce.org/2009/06/05/action-alert-stop-peruvian-infrastructure-push/

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