Southern Peru was placed under martial law today. Prime Minister Yehude Simon declared a state of emergency in the provinces of Tacna, Jorge Basadre, Candarave and Tarata after reports that three people were killed and dozens injured in recent protests. Violent demonstrations started last Thursday when 4,000 demonstrators clashed with police and set fire to a government building. Protests were sparked by new legislation which cuts the amount of mining tax revenues Tacna receives in favour of the neighbouring region of Moquegua.
The toD verdict: The controversial law and subsequent protests stem from the geographical
and economic cleavages dividing the country. Peru's mining sector has been capitalising
on high metals prices, with GDP growth for 2008 expected to reach 9%. However,
the profits largely benefit the main coastal cities. Many in the Andean and
Amazon interior still live in acute poverty. According to analysts,
successive governments have grappled with the difficulty of ensuring an
equitable distribution of growth amongst societal sectors and geographical
regions. Keep up to date with the latest developments and sharpest perspectives in a world of strife and struggle.
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Such socio-regional polarization, which has been building for some time, has resulted in a revived culture of protest. President García's recent cabinet reshuffle was in part a response to a number of different demonstration campaigns at the beginning of October 2008.
Experts suggest that it is necessary for the government to engage seriously
with the protesters. The potential for further hostilities is ever-present;
according to the ombudsman's office in Peru, the lack of channels for
political communication means that social mobilisation can quickly turn
violent. However, Prime Minister Simon has said
he will not negotiate with authorities in the southern Tacna region while protests continue. Until
now Peruvian governments have often sought to extinguish social unrest without
tackling its root cause. In the longer term, therefore, the government must
enact social policies which address Peru's regional and economic inequalities.
Aid workers kidnapped in Somalia
Gunmen raided an airstrip in central Somalia on Wednesday, kidnapping six
members of the French aid group Action Against Hunger. Four European aid
workers and two Kenyan pilots were taken from the airstrip in the town of Dhusa-Mareb, near the
Ethiopian border. The town, jointly run by the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) and
the Shebab group, remains an Islamist stronghold. Large parts of the
country were taken over by the ICU in 2006 before being ousted by government
forces backed by Ethiopian troops. Wracked by conflict since 1991, Somalia now faces an Islamist and nationalist insurgency.
Civilians have borne the brunt of the
fighting. More than half the population (some 3 million people) require food or
medical help. Aid agencies have been increasingly
targeted in recent months, making their operations virtually impossible
to sustain.
Four
killed in twin Baghdad bombs
Further bomb attacks struck both
sides of the sectarian divide in Baghdad
on Thursday morning. Four people were killed in twin bomb attacks in a Sunni
area of the capital. Reports indicate that at least two of those killed were
members of an Awakening Council. Such groups, formed by insurgents who have
switched sides, now oppose al-Qaeda in Iraq. Elsewhere in the capital a
roadside bomb exploded in the Shia stronghold of Sadr City.
Nine people were injured. Another roadside bomb detonated in central Bab
al-Sheikh neighbourhood. One person was killed and four others injured.
Violence in the capital has increased markedly this week. More than thirty people have been killed, and more than eighty wounded in a series of daily bomb attacks. But US officials say that attacks in Baghdad, averaging about four a day, are down by nearly 90 per cent from levels in late 2006 before America's surge and the emergence of Awakening Councils.
Pipeline
explosion in Turkey
An explosion
tore through the Turkish section of the Kirkuk-Ceyhan oil pipeline late Wednesday.
Turkey's
state-owned pipeline company Botas turned off the valves, cutting the transport
of oil following the explosion, which left a four-metre wide crater in the
ground. Although the cause of the blast is, as yet, unknown, the Kurdistan
Workers Party (PKK) claimed
responsibility for an explosion on the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline in August.
US airstrike kills militant and civilians in Afghanistan
Fifteen Taliban militants and seven civilians were reported killed
on Thursday after an airstrike in northwest Afghanistan. The incident occurred
in Ghormach district of Badghis province, after a long clash between militants
and government/foreign forces.
The attack comes just one day after President Hamid Karzai, in a speech
to congratulate President-elect Obama, demanded a halt to civilian casualties
in US operations. Earlier this week a coalition airstrike in the south of Afghanistan
killed 37 people, mostly women and children, who had gathered for a wedding. US and
NATO forces have killed
at least 275 civilians this year.
