On the shore of a lake adjoining Peru’s broad and muddy Marañón River, a major tributary of the Amazon, Aurelia Lomas stirs a large pot over an open fire. Asked if she worries about the safety of the water in which rice simmers, Lomas shrugs. “We don’t have any other alternative,” she says. A day earlier, on Feb. 19, Lomas and other residents of 48 mostly Kukama Kukamiria indigenous communities in the Marañón watershed jammed into the community building in this tiny village. There, one government representative after another presented the analyses of water, soil and sediment samples taken last September near Block 8X, part of an oil lease operated by Argentina-based Pluspetrol. Although figures and technical terms may have eluded many of those... [Log in to read more]