Indigenous demonstrators shut down oil operations in one of Peru’s oldest Amazonian fields, accusing the government of failing to address their demands, while four communities downriver scored a partial victory in a lawsuit over an oil spill that occurred in 2014. Achuar, Quechua and Kichwa communities on the Corrientes, Pastaza and Tigre rivers, in Peru’s northeastern Loreto region, occupied wellheads and other installations in the oil field known as Block 192. They did so after the government refused to guarantee prior consultation of indigenous communities before a new lease is granted, probably next year. Block 192 has been operated by the Canadian company Frontera Energy (formerly Pacific Stratus Energy) since 2015, when the lease held by Argentina-based Pluspetrol expired. A consultation of indigenous communities was held in 2015 (see “Peru accord targets oil cleanup and public health”—EcoAméricas, March ’15), but leaders of some of the organizations involved say... [Log in to read more]