Guatemalan mine dispute militarizes region

[cratehorus]

The neighbors of the San Rafael silver mine no longer come out of their homes for fear of the machine-gun toting troops and police who man checkpoints in these green, wooded mountains. The plaza in the town of San Rafael Las Flores, where the community used to mingle, is now deserted.

The fear that rules this terrain, where residents are mostly Xinca Indians, recalls the bad old days of the country's three-decade-long civil war, which killed as many as 200,000 people. But what's brought in the troops this time are protests over plans by Vancouver-based Tahoe Resources Inc. to tap what the company says is one of the five largest silver deposits in the world.

Protesters say the project, called El Escobal, will drain or pollute the local water supply, and hundreds of people have blocked roads and burned buildings to stop it from going forward. That's tested President Otto Perez Molina, who sent in hundreds of troops and suspended the right to hold public gatherings in four townships near the mine in early May. It was the second time during his 16 months in office that he has declared a state of siege in response to protests against a foreign-run mining project.

With violence rising, the mine protests have now emerged not only as a threat to Perez Molina's young administration but also a warning to other foreign companies seeking to invest in the region. The residents of San Rafael, however, say they're been left with no choice but to fight. They also accuse the government of favoring foreign investors over communities.

"This is affecting us, we feel intimidated," said 18-year-old Miriam Munoz, whose nervous parents didn't want her to go to school because of all the soldiers and police outside. "The situation isn't going to change until the president comes to deal with it."

Such conflicts are breaking out all over Latin America, where local resistance to foreign-driven mining projects have paralyzed whole regions and claimed dozens of casualties. At the same time, such projects have become ever more popular as world prices for copper, iron ore and other metals have boomed, driven in large part by growing demand from China.

In Peru, such protests have presented a major challenge to President Ollanta Humala, while similar outrage over foreign exploitation of local resources helped defeat presidents in Bolivia.
The deadliest clash occurred on Jan. 11, when a shootout between protesters and mine security guards left one farmer and two guards dead. Then, on March 17, unidentified gunmen abducted four members of the Xinca parliament in confusing circumstances. One ended up dead.

Faced with the growing violence, the national government announced the creation of a mediation commission, and on April 3, the government granted a 25-year exploitation license to the San Rafael mine "after it fulfilled all the requisites set by law," according to Davila. The mine has the necessary permits but is not yet operating.

After another protest left a policeman dead and six locals wounded, Perez Molina declared a 30-day state of siege that banned public gatherings and other civil liberties in four townships around the mine in Jalapa and Santa Rosa states. Some 500 police officers and 2,000 soldiers were sent to the area. The president later lowered the alert to a state of prevention, saying troops could no longer detain or arrest people without justification.

http://www.sfgate.com/news/world/article...568109.php

[dazzn]

I hate land mines.

i hate cruelty also.