TWN Info Service on Free Trade Agreements

03 July 2006


http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2006/junio/juev29/peru.html
Prensa Latina
June 29, 2006

More than 2,000 Peruvians March Against Free Trade Agreement


LIMA (PL).—Thousands of Peruvians shook the center of Lima with a march against the ratification by Congress of the Free Trade Treaty (FTT) with the United States.

During the mobilization, which covered various main arteries of this capital and ended up outside Parliament, the 2,000-plus participants described the 79 parliamentarians who supported the measure as traitors, Prensa Latina confirmed.

However, the march also served as a clear warning to President-elect Alan GarcĂ–a, from the Peruvian Aprista Party (APRA) to fulfill his campaign promise to review the FTT if it was approved by the present Congress.

The demonstrators' slogans focused on their rejection of the mandate of outgoing Alejandro Toledo, Congress members, the judicial power and GarcĂ–a, whom they told: "Alan like it or lump it, the people are out!"

The march, which passed without incident, was closely policed by a strong force of agents armed with clubs, teargas, rubber bullets and backed up by water cannon.

AntolĂ–n Huascar, president of the Peru Trade Promotion Agreement Coordinating Committee, told PL that with this mobilization the people have risen up against oppression, while demanding that the agreement, which will seriously affect Peruvian agriculture, should be annulled.

"On a par with our demonstrations," he continued, "we are going to take the case before the Constitutional Court for it to declare the ratification outside of the law, a result that could been known in 60 days, according to legal sources."

He confirmed that an indefinite agricultural strike is scheduled for July 4 and also warned that any act of violence on the demonstrations will be the government's sole responsibility.

The text, called the Law of Andean Commercial Promotion Agreement signed in Washington on April 12, was based on findings by the Congress Foreign Trade and Foreign Relations committees.

Previously, four bills were passed to guarantee compensation to national agriculture, aimed at establishing a legal base for the Treaty's ratification, pending ratification by both the U.S. House and Senate.