Category Archives: Peru

The village still suffering from Peru mercury spill fallout – after 20 years

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When the people of Choropampa saw a bright, silvery liquid on the road, they imagined it was valuable. Two decades on, the toxic truth is all too apparent

When a truck spilled mercury from a gold mine on the dirt road outside her house, Francisca Guarniz Imelda scooped it up with her bare hands, thinking it had healing powers.

She took it home to her mud-brick house in Choropampa, in Peru’s northern Cajamarca region. The heat of the day vaporised some of the mercury, contaminating the walls and ceiling with the toxic metal.

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Coronavirus: Briton returns to UK on repatriation flight from Peru – video

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John McNamee, 32, returned to the UK on Tuesday after two weeks in an Airbnb in Lima while the whole of Peru has been under strict lockdown because of the coronavirus pandemic. More than 1,000 Britons had registered with the UK embassy in Peru for assistance in returning home due to a near total absence of commercial flights and McNamee was one of about 200 on the first repatriation flight out of the country

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Australians trapped in India’s coronavirus lockdown fear running out of food and water

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Thousands of Australians caught up in India’s sweeping lockdown are pleading for government help to get home

Thousands of Australians caught by India’s dramatic nationwide shutdown say they face running out of food and water or being evicted from accommodation, as 1.3 billion people across world’s second-most populous nation are ordered to stay indoors.

One state leader, Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, warned if the lockdown was not obeyed, he would order police to shoot-on-sight those who went outside.

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Britons stranded in Peru could be flown home early next week

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South American country closed borders a week ago in attempt to stop spread of coronavirus, stranding 400 British citizens

Hundreds of Britons stranded in Peru due to the coronavirus pandemic could be flown home early next week, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has said.

More than 400 British and Irish citizens are believed to be in the Andean nation and have been unable to leave following a 15-day government lockdown imposed since Monday.

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Anger grows among Britons on holiday as lockdowns block returns

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Stranded British travellers decry Foreign Office assistance and ‘exorbitant’ replacement flights

Thousands of British holidaymakers could find themselves stranded abroad, as flight cancellations, travel restrictions and lockdowns due to the global coronavirus pandemic complicate their journeys home.

As many as 100,000 tourists may still be in Spain, despite a near-total lockdown and government orders that all hotels be shut down within the week. Recent days have seen the epidemic in Spain spiral into one of Europe’s worst, claiming more than 1,000 lives.

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Australians stuck in Peru amid Covid-19 outbreak advised to book charter flight home

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Thousands of travellers frantically trying to fly back to Australia after government warning over coronavirus pandemic
• Australia coronavirus live: NSW now has 307 confirmed cases, up 40 since yesterday

More than 170 Australians trapped in locked-down Peru have been advised by the government to find a commercial charter flight to get out of the country.

Some passengers have been able to get on chartered flights to the US, while others have been offered a dedicated charter flight from Lima to Sydney, but at a cost of more than $5,000.

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Roasted, curried, sweetened … guinea pig meat returns to the plates of Peru

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Growing demand for cuy meat, which has long been a national delicacy in Peru, is providing rural women with livelihoods

The growing popularity of guinea pig meat in high-end restaurants in Peru is helping to usher in the return of a traditional, and environmentally friendly, industry led by women.

Top chefs in Peru, Ecuador and Colombia have brought traditional cuy meat back in popularity with roasted, curried and even sweetened versions appearing on menus.

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Peruvian leader appeals to watchdog over ‘terrible harm’ caused by oil firm

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Chief representative of Quechua communities in north Peru urges OECD to support battle against ‘the tainting of land and rivers’

An Amazonian leader has travelled from Peru to the Netherlands to lodge a complaint with the global trade watchdog about an Amsterdam-based oil firm, demanding that the company clean up decades of pollution from his people’s lands. .

Aurelio Chino has accused Pluspetrol of using “letterbox” holding companies in tax havens like the Netherlands to avoid paying taxes in developing countries such as Peru.

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Peru: why a fundamentalist sect became an unexpected winner in elections

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Political party of Los Israelitas wins second largest share in new congress, and prompts concern over their fundamentalist views

In a country that takes pride in its colourful folklore, Los Israelitas – a religious sect whose members dress in flowing biblical robes – were regarded as just one more strand in Peru’s cultural tapestry.

That was until their political party became an unexpected winner in parliamentary elections on Sunday.

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Scandal overshadows Peru election’s focus on gender equality

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Allegations of domestic violence and marital infidelity have bogged down one of the most diverse parties

Scandals involving domestic violence and marital infidelity have overshadowed the campaign to elect a new congress in Peru, in which gender equality and women’s rights have been key issues.

Peruvians will elect 130 new lawmakers on Sunday after the previous chamber was dissolved by President Martín Vizcarra in a controversial but popular move in September.

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Every McDonald’s in Peru closes amid protests at death of two workers

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Chain to close all its restaurants for two days of mourning after deaths lead to protests over workplace safety

The death by electrocution of two young employees at a McDonald’s restaurant in Lima has spurred protests and stoked anger over working conditions in the wider economy, which are viewed as exploitative and sometimes dangerous.

Peru’s public prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation into the deaths of Alexandra Porras, 19, and her former boyfriend Gabriel Campos, 18, who were reported to have died in the early hours of Sunday while cleaning the kitchen at the fast-food outlet.

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Keiko Fujimori: Peru opposition leader walks free from jail

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Rightwing leader imprisoned for more than a year pending corruption trial says release corrects a ‘process full of abuse and arbitrariness’

The Peruvian opposition leader Keiko Fujimori has walked free after being jailed for more than a year pending a trial over allegations she accepted illegal campaign contributions from the Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht.

Fujimori, leader of the powerful rightwing Popular Force party, left prison in the Chorrillos district of the capital, Lima, according to a Reuters witness at the scene, where hundreds of supporters gathered outside in anticipation of her release.

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Bolivia’s Evo Morales flies to Mexico, but vows to return with ‘strength and energy’

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Former president says it hurts to leave ‘for political reasons’ as foreign minister confirms he has left for Mexico

Bolivia’s former president Evo Morales has boarded a plane bound for Mexico where he has been granted asylum, the Mexican foreign minister has announced.

Earlier on Monday evening Morales tweeted a farewell after his resignation in the wake of a disputed election, saying that he would be take up the offer of asylum in Mexico but would soon “return with greater strength and energy”.

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‘Geography is a problem’: slowing the silent spread of HIV in the Amazon

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A team of doctors and volunteers are travelling by boat to treat and educate indigenous communities at higher risk of Aids

As the serpentine Amazon river meanders through a sea of jungle, a little red boat speeds across its muddy brown waters. Powered by two outboard motors, the vessel carries a cargo of volunteers, medics and nurses, an awning, and dozens of HIV screening tests.

The first stop is Nueva Vida Yahua, an indigenous village 40 minutes down the Nanay river from Iquitos. The women are dressed in red skirts and grass tops worn draped over their shoulders, the men in long grass skirts and headdresses made from blue macaw feathers.

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Money and maps: is this how to save the Amazon’s 400bn trees?

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Alarmed by the impact of logging, indigenous Peruvians are using satellite mapping to manage their land

The first thing Ramón heard about the deal was the televisions. A number of families from the Asháninka indigenous group had received them from outsiders, in exchange for land. Loggers were interested in the mahogany, oak and tornillo trees that grow to impressive heights in this part of the rainforest around Cutivireni in central Peru.

The loggers had other means of persuasion, besides bribery. They might offer to build a school or a meeting house in exchange for timber. When the work ran over budget, they would demand money – and since the Asháninka had none, they would take more trees to service the debt, according to Adelaida Bustamante, the community treasurer. And if that failed, they used violence. In 2014, four forest defenders from the Asháninka were murdered for their campaign to keep loggers off their land (Ramón asked me not to use his real name).

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Forest guardians: the Asháninka of Peru – in pictures

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In an area of the Amazon vulnerable to illegal loggers, Cool Earth, a UK-based charity, is working with the Asháninka people to reduce deforestation. Photographer Alicia Canter travelled to Cutivireni in central Peru

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‘Unprecedented’ murder charges for loggers in deaths of indigenous activists

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Two timber executives and three loggers charged in shooting deaths of activists who battled illegal logging in Peruvian Amazon

Prosecutors in Peru have charged five men in the timber industry with the 2014 murders of four indigenous activists who had battled illegal logging in the Amazon jungle.

Two timber executives and three loggers have been charged with the shooting deaths of the activists, the prosecutor Otoniel Jara, who works in Peru’s remote Ucayali region, told the Associated Press on Wednesday.

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Student in Peru makes history by writing thesis in the Incas’ language

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Quechua is still spoken by 8 million people across the Andes, but Roxana Quispe Collantes hopes she can give it added value

A doctoral student in Peru has made history by becoming the first person to write and defend a thesis in Quechua – the language of the Incas, which is still spoken by millions of people in the Andes.

Roxana Quispe Collantes received top marks from Lima’s San Marcos university, the oldest in the Americas, for her study on Peruvian and Latin American literature, which focused on poetry written in Quechua.

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