Manner of Speaking
Joined: 09 Jan 2003
|
 Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 7:37 pm Post subject: Battle Over Bolivian Mines Kills 16 |
 |
|
| Quote: |
Battle Over Bolivian Mines Kills 16
Hostilities Cease After 700 Police Take Control Of Mining Town; 60+ Injured
AP) Two rival bands of miners battling for control of Bolivia's richest tin deposits ceased hostilities late Friday, after more than a day of fighting that left at least 16 dead and more than 60 injured, officials said.
Representatives of a 700-member police force dispatched by President Evo Morales' government to the mining town of Huanuni, 180 miles south of La Paz, took control of the mountain where much of the fighting occurred and negotiated with members from both groups. �They have come down the mountain bearing flags of peace,� said Lt. Col. Vladmir Suazmabar, referring to Posokoni Mountain.
Officials from the two mining groups also met with government ministers in La Paz. Presidential spokesman Alex Contreras said the meeting yielded a peace agreement, but he did not provide details. �We believe that now is the time for us to support peace for the people of Huanuni, and to work to solve this problem,� he said.
It wasn't immediately known if the halt in fighting would turn into a permanent cease-fire. A truce on Thursday night lasted long enough for both sides to bury their dead.
Meanwhile, Bolivian President Evo Morales replaced Bolivia's minister of mines and the head of the state mining company. Mines Minister Walker Villaroel had faced calls to step down since violence began Thursday morning in Huanuni, a mining town 180 miles south of La Paz, where rival mining groups battled with guns and dynamite over access to Bolivia's richest deposit. Villaroel will be replaced by Guillermo Dalence Salinas, Morales announced late Friday.
The head of state-owned mining company Comibol, Juan Cabrera, will be replaced by Hugo Miranda, Bolivia's populist president said. The violence began Thursday morning, when hundreds of miners belonging to independent cooperatives stormed the state-owned Huanuni mine, demanding more access to its tin deposits. State-employed miners counterattacked to regain control of the mine and the groups exchanged gunshots and dynamite.
The clash followed a breakdown in negotiations in the nearby city of Oruro in which the miners' cooperatives rejected a government proposal dividing Huanuni's veins of tin between the two groups. The cooperatives strongly backed Morales' election last year, and the administration has already granted them access to a portion of the Huanuni deposit on on the barren slopes of Posokoni Mountain.
Miners from both sides threw dynamite and homemade explosives at each other from ridge to ridge, sometimes separated by no more than 50 feet. Miners, some only in their teens, carried sticks of dynamite in backpacks and tucked in their belts.
In town, residents held a prayer vigil in the local church for the violence to end. Blood stains and holes from explosives littered a soccer field in the Dolores neighborhood following fighting there Thursday. On Friday morning, members of the miners' cooperative rolled three tires packed with explosives down the side of the mountain toward town, causing an enormous explosion.
The battle for Huanuni has roots going back at least 20 years. In 1985, Comibol shuttered mines throughout Bolivia after a collapse in the world metal market, laying off some 30,000 workers. While many of Huanuni's unemployed miners sought work in other fields and other parts of the country, some remained, and as prices recovered, they formed independent mining cooperatives to mine tin on their own.
Bolivia eventually granted the Huanuni mine concession to British-based Allied Deals. When the company, now known as RBG Resources, abandoned its Bolivian operations in 2005, the mine returned to Comibol, despite demands from the miners' cooperatives for some control over the valuable deposits. Rising tin prices have stoked demands by the independent miners, who see the Huanuni vein as a rare source of steady employment in the poor South American country.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/06/world/main2072252.shtml?source=RSSattr=World_2072252 |
|
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
