Deadly riots force Peru to suspend football season
Sports officials delay top games as violent political protests against president bring capital to a standstill
PERU was forced to postpone the start of its football season after thousands of protesters from rural areas stormed the capital, engulfing Lima in tear gas and flames in the latest violent clashes to hit the country.
The demonstrators from Peru’s remote regions, where dozens have died in nearly six weeks of turmoil, poured into Lima demanding the resignation of Dina Boluarte, the president.
Peasant patrol groups, or “ronderos”, carrying traditional whips, arrived in long convoys of buses, after hours or several days of travel, and brought swathes of the capital to a standstill as they flooded busy roads and clashed with riot police.
The protests played out as a cat-andmouse game, with demonstrators – some of whom threw rocks – trying to get through solid lines of police wielding batons and armed with large shields.
Officers responded with tear gas that sent protesters fleeing.
A red haze of smoke and tear gas hung over the city by sunset.
Sports officials have ordered the cancellation of all events scheduled until Monday, including first division matches.
Liga 1, its top division, will delay its first match until Jan 27, Peru’s Professional Football League (LFP) said.
It added that it hoped the social situation would improve to allow for the return of Peru’s most popular sport.
The government called on everyone who could to work from home as the clashes escalated.
Dramatic images showed a blaze enveloping the top of a building near Lima’s historic Plaza San Martin, a prominent square in the city where demonstrators had gathered for hours.
The cause and extent of the fire was not immediately clear. At least 53 people have died in recent clashes between protesters and police. It is the country’s worst political violence in more than two decades.
At least 19 of the deaths occurred in a single protest in southern Peru last week.
The political unrest began in response to the ousting last month of Pedro Castillo, Peru’s first leader from a rural Andean background. Mr Castillo was impeached and arrested in December after he attempted to dissolve Congress and rule by decree.
Ms Boluarte was Mr Castillo’s vicepresident and replaced him.
Protesters have demanded her resignation, but the unrest has grown into a broader movement expressing discontent over the deaths of demonstrators, and a government seen as corrupt and indifferent to the plight of its poor.
Anger at Ms Boluarte was the common thread as protesters called for her resignation and street traders sold T-shirts saying, “Out, Dina Boluarte,” “Dina murderer, Peru repudiates you,” and “New elections, let them all leave.”
Ms Boluarte was defiant in a latenight television address on Thursday in which she thanked police for getting the “violent protests” under control and vowed to prosecute those responsible.
The president criticised protesters for “not having any kind of social agenda that the country needs,” accused them of “wanting to break the rule of law” and raised questions about their financing.
Ms Boluarte has said she supports a plan to hold elections for president and Congress in 2024, two years earlier than scheduled.
Protesters said they would not be cowed. “This won’t end tomorrow, but only once we achieve our goals,” said David Lozada, 61, as he looked at a line of police officers wearing helmets and carrying shields.
“I don’t know what they’re thinking, do they want to spark a civil war?”