Stranded tourists make way to safety amid unrest
CUSCO: Protests dwindled in intensity in Peru on Saturday and thousands of tourists trapped in the interior boarded planes to escape unrest as President Dina Boluarte again vowed that she would not step down.
Some 4,500 tourists, many of them European and North American, rushed to the international airport in Cusco to catch flights after being stranded much of the week by simmering political unrest.
“By Sunday at the latest, all the stranded tourists will leave,” Tourism and Commerce Minister Luis Fernando Helguero told the Andina state news agency.
The state human rights ombudsman reported 70 roadblocks around the South American nation, and the toll from the unrest rose to 19 dead and 569 injured.
But the minister of defence and the head of the armed forces both said protests were diminishing in intensity.
“We have gradually been recovering normality along the roads, at the airports, in the cities. Normality is returning but it is not yet achieved,” said General Manuel Gomez de la Torre, head of the military joint chiefs of staff.
Defence Minister Alberto Otarola cautioned that “organised violent acts” were aimed at damaging airports, highways, natural gas pipelines and hydroelectric installations.
“The trend is downward. But we remain on alert. The situation of violence hasn’t passed and the crisis goes on,” Mr Otarola said.
Ms Boluarte, the lawyer who assumed the reins of the country on Dec 7 after leftist President Pedro Castillo tried to dissolve Congress and rule by decree, only to be ousted and thrown in jail, again insisted that she would not bend to protesters and step down.
On Friday, House speaker Jose Williams said the vote on the election schedule could be revisited during a forthcoming session of Congress.
In her televised address, Ms Boluarte said if armed troops were on the streets, “it has been to take care of and protect” Peru’s citizens, adding that the protests were “overflowing” with violent elements that were coordinated and not spontaneous.
Protesters are calling for the release of Mr Castillo, the resignation of Ms Boluarte and closure of Congress, and immediate general elections.