23536
Bluelight Crew
http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/...they-will-fight-to-defend-cocaine-source?lite
VRAE, Peru — For decades, locals in this isolated Andean valley have cultivated copious quantities of coca, the small bush at the heart of Washington’s war on drugs.
Untroubled by the level of narco-violence that’s roiled Mexico and Colombia, and beyond the reach of the Peruvian government, many poor farmers here have come to depend on coca as their only source of cash.
No wonder that, according to United Nations data, more coca now grows in the Valley of the Apurimac and Ene Rivers (known as VRAE) than any other region on the planet.
But that’s about to change — and many here are predicting strife.
Peru’s president, Ollanta Humala, has vowed to finally tame and control the VRAE. A key part of that strategy will be forced coca eradication — sending in heavily armed police to uproot the plants by hand.
His anti-drug czar, Carmen Masias, is keeping mum about the precise dates, but the move is widely expected within the next 12 months.
Already, the government is preparing to expropriate more than 1,100 acres of farmland on the valley floor to build a new military airbase, and weathering attacks from the feared Shining Path rebels to pave the road into the VRAE.
Driven by a particularly savage interpretation of China’s Maoist revolution, the Shining Path launched a civil war in the 1980s and early ‘90s that cost 70,000 lives.
Since then, the insurgents have been cornered into the far reaches of the VRAE, from where they still launch occasional attacks, killing more than 100 police and soldiers in and around the valley since 2008.
“There will be serious conflict,” said Fredy Linares, 48, from the village of Otari. He stands to lose the family farm, which his father cleared from virgin forest three decades ago.
“There will be another guerrilla group. Not like Shining Path but a new one. No one is going to put up with having their crops destroyed. Of course, people are going to rise up.”
The story continues: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/...they-will-fight-to-defend-cocaine-source?lite
VRAE, Peru — For decades, locals in this isolated Andean valley have cultivated copious quantities of coca, the small bush at the heart of Washington’s war on drugs.
Untroubled by the level of narco-violence that’s roiled Mexico and Colombia, and beyond the reach of the Peruvian government, many poor farmers here have come to depend on coca as their only source of cash.
No wonder that, according to United Nations data, more coca now grows in the Valley of the Apurimac and Ene Rivers (known as VRAE) than any other region on the planet.
But that’s about to change — and many here are predicting strife.
Peru’s president, Ollanta Humala, has vowed to finally tame and control the VRAE. A key part of that strategy will be forced coca eradication — sending in heavily armed police to uproot the plants by hand.
His anti-drug czar, Carmen Masias, is keeping mum about the precise dates, but the move is widely expected within the next 12 months.
Already, the government is preparing to expropriate more than 1,100 acres of farmland on the valley floor to build a new military airbase, and weathering attacks from the feared Shining Path rebels to pave the road into the VRAE.
Driven by a particularly savage interpretation of China’s Maoist revolution, the Shining Path launched a civil war in the 1980s and early ‘90s that cost 70,000 lives.
Since then, the insurgents have been cornered into the far reaches of the VRAE, from where they still launch occasional attacks, killing more than 100 police and soldiers in and around the valley since 2008.
“There will be serious conflict,” said Fredy Linares, 48, from the village of Otari. He stands to lose the family farm, which his father cleared from virgin forest three decades ago.
“There will be another guerrilla group. Not like Shining Path but a new one. No one is going to put up with having their crops destroyed. Of course, people are going to rise up.”
The story continues: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/...they-will-fight-to-defend-cocaine-source?lite
