The Conflict

One month (July 2009) after a bloody clash between indigenous natives (Awajun), local migrants and the Peruvian national police, life outside the provincial city of Bagua, in Peru's north Amazon jungle, returned to normal. 

On June 5, 2009 the Peruvian National Police, using tanks, helicopters, tear gas and firearms, attacked a roadblock approximately 450 miles north of the capital, Lima. Protestors had blocked roads for two months to demonstrate opposition to laws that permitted outsiders to exploit logging, mining and gave oil companies access to their ancestral grounds - the Amazon. 

According to Amnesty International more than 30 indigenous citizens and 22 police were killed. Shortly after the mayhem Peru's Congress repealed two key pieces of legislation that contributed to the protest.  

The indigenous community commonly refer to the attack and the events that led up to it as El Conflicto (The Conflict).