Fade the Butcher
03-14-2006, 09:04 AM
It looks like the cat is out of the bag.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/13/AR2006031301657.html
LATACUNGA, Ecuador (Reuters) - Several thousand Ecuadorean Indians marched and set up roadblocks in the central highlands on Monday to demand the government end free-trade talks with the United States.
The massive protests paralyzed the central provinces of Cotopaxi and Imbabura, which border the capital Quito, and Indian protesters said thousands more will join demonstrations on Tuesday. No violence was reported.
"We will not let the government sign this deal," said Angelina, an Indian peasant standing on a dirt barricade blocking a highway in Cotopaxi.
"We feed this country with our crops ... we cannot compete with the farm products from the United States," she said. Angelina, like others interviewed for the story, asked that her last name not be used.
Indians, who represent a large part of the country's rural labor force, said the trade deal will put them at a disadvantage with American farmers and further disrupt their ancestral culture.
The Indian demonstrations presented President Alfredo Palacio with a new headache a day after he diffused a strike by contract oil workers that crimped the country's crucial oil production.
Ecuador, which started Andean trade pact talks in May 2004, has been deadlocked with the United States, mostly over agricultural issues. Neighboring Colombia and Peru already reached a trade agreement with Washington.
Faced with popular pressure to drop the free-trade pact, Palacio has said he will not sign any deal that is unfair to Ecuadoreans. Indian protesters vowed to keep up their demonstration until the government promises not to sign.
"This deal will hurt us, the Indians, the most," said Humberto Cholango, an indigenous leader and organizer. "We are peasants and this trade deal will flood Ecuador with cheap farm products from the United States."
Union workers and peasant leaders have threatened to join the demonstrations. Analysts said the protests could underscore the challenges facing the country's indigenous groups as a political force.
"This is a test for the Ecuadorean Indian movement," said Francisco Rhon, political analyst at the Andean Center for Popular Action, a Quito think tank. "The movement is at the middle of a crisis and this protest will show if they still have political power in this country."
In recent years Ecuador's Indian movement, once one of the most powerful in Latin America, lost much of its sway as the rank-and-file grew disillusioned with their leadership.
Between 12 and 30 percent of Ecuador's 13 million citizens are Indian, according to some estimates.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/13/AR2006031301657.html
LATACUNGA, Ecuador (Reuters) - Several thousand Ecuadorean Indians marched and set up roadblocks in the central highlands on Monday to demand the government end free-trade talks with the United States.
The massive protests paralyzed the central provinces of Cotopaxi and Imbabura, which border the capital Quito, and Indian protesters said thousands more will join demonstrations on Tuesday. No violence was reported.
"We will not let the government sign this deal," said Angelina, an Indian peasant standing on a dirt barricade blocking a highway in Cotopaxi.
"We feed this country with our crops ... we cannot compete with the farm products from the United States," she said. Angelina, like others interviewed for the story, asked that her last name not be used.
Indians, who represent a large part of the country's rural labor force, said the trade deal will put them at a disadvantage with American farmers and further disrupt their ancestral culture.
The Indian demonstrations presented President Alfredo Palacio with a new headache a day after he diffused a strike by contract oil workers that crimped the country's crucial oil production.
Ecuador, which started Andean trade pact talks in May 2004, has been deadlocked with the United States, mostly over agricultural issues. Neighboring Colombia and Peru already reached a trade agreement with Washington.
Faced with popular pressure to drop the free-trade pact, Palacio has said he will not sign any deal that is unfair to Ecuadoreans. Indian protesters vowed to keep up their demonstration until the government promises not to sign.
"This deal will hurt us, the Indians, the most," said Humberto Cholango, an indigenous leader and organizer. "We are peasants and this trade deal will flood Ecuador with cheap farm products from the United States."
Union workers and peasant leaders have threatened to join the demonstrations. Analysts said the protests could underscore the challenges facing the country's indigenous groups as a political force.
"This is a test for the Ecuadorean Indian movement," said Francisco Rhon, political analyst at the Andean Center for Popular Action, a Quito think tank. "The movement is at the middle of a crisis and this protest will show if they still have political power in this country."
In recent years Ecuador's Indian movement, once one of the most powerful in Latin America, lost much of its sway as the rank-and-file grew disillusioned with their leadership.
Between 12 and 30 percent of Ecuador's 13 million citizens are Indian, according to some estimates.