Weekly Report - 23 January 2014 (WR-14-03)

A bitter smile. That was how the president of Peru’s north-eastern region of Cajamarca, Gregorio Santos, greeted the news on 22 January that the San Ignacio provincial public prosecutor’s office will seek to convict him to 30 years in jail for kidnap and resisting authority. The case dates back to 2005 when Santos was a leader of the ronderos (self-defence militia) of San Ignacio. Santos insists that he has no case to answer and that he is the victim of political persecution because of his staunch opposition to the US$4.8bn Conga copper and gold mine. A week earlier some 750 protesters, led by local ronderos, marched to the proposed site of the Conga mine by the El Perol lagoon on Minera Yanacocha company property, and set fire to a telephone tower and security hut.

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