Due to violent protests by local Indians against exploration in search of copper deposits, the government of Ecuador declared a state of emergency in the Panantza-San Carlos area, in the Ecuadorian part of the Amazon, and sent troops and police there.
About sixty Shuar Indians attacked the police guarding the lands of one of the Chinese companies where a copper mine is to be built. One police officer was killed and several were injured.
The Shuar Indians have already attacked the copper mines in the Amazon. Indigenous peoples are trying to protect areas that they believe are captured by immigrants from Europe and which are now also being exploited by Chinese companies. In search of copper, Chinese investors are conducting large-scale geological exploration in the Ecuadorian province of Morona Santiago in the Amazon Basin.
In November, Indians attacked another facility, Exploracobres, where 14 police officers were injured. Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa, in response to recent events, called on Ecuadorians to "maintain unity against barbarism."
Correa wants to develop the copper mining industry, seeing it as a new economic opportunity for a country whose economy is based on oil and electricity exports.
Indians block the creation of a copper mine in Ecuador
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