Nine policemen die in bloody clashes with Amazon Indians

Police open fire on Amazon Indians blocking the road in Bagua Grande in Peru's northern province of Utcubamba on Friday.

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Lima: President Alan Garcia laboured on Saturday to contain Peru’s worst political violence in years, as nine more police officers were killed in a bloody standoff with Amazon Indians fighting his efforts to exploit oil and gas on their native lands.

The new deaths brought to 22 the number of police killed – seven with spears – since security forces moved early Friday to break up a roadblock manned by 5,000 protesters.

Protest leaders said at least 30 Indians, including three children, died in the clashes. Authorities said they could confirm only nine civilian deaths, but cabinet chief Yehude Simon told reporters that 155 people had been injured, about a third of them with bullet wounds.

He announced a 3pm-6am curfew in the affected region and said authorities had made 72 arrests.

“The government was required to take these measures, not only for the president of the republic but for all 28 million Peruvians,” Simon said of breaking up the protests, which blocked the flow of oil and gas out of the Amazon and prevented food and supplies from coming in.

“We’ve all been affected one way or another by the protest& when they take over highways and strategic points that can affect the national economy,” Simon said.

The political violence is the Andean country’s worst since the Shining Path insurgency was quelled more than a decade ago, and it bodes ill for Garcia’s ambitious plans to boost Peru’s oil and gas output.

It began early on Friday when security forces moved to break up a roadblock protesters mounted in early April. About 1,000 protesters seized police during the melee, taking more than three dozen hostage, officials said.

Twenty-two officers were rescued in Saturday’s storming of Station No 6 at state-owned Petroperu in Imacita, in the jungle state of Amazonas, Defence Minister Antero Florez told the Radioprogramas radio network. He said seven officers were missing.