Peruvian activists visit London to raise the alarm on the growing political, criminal, human rights and environmental crisis in their country – and the part that UK mining interests and consumers have to play.
Four leading activists from Peru will share their perspectives and lived experience of human rights and environmental harms resulting from mining operations, including those carried out by UK-based companies. The event will take place at 6pm on 1 December, at Landscape Architecture, UCL, 77 Wicklow Street, London WC1X 9JY. Full details here.
During this public event, organised by the London Mining Network with the Peru Support Group and CAFOD, the activists will talk about how human rights defenders are being persecuted, environmental laws sidelined and institutions eroded in the rush to profit from the country’s mineral wealth. They will explain the business and criminal roots of the country’s ongoing political crisis and highlight how both legal and illegal mining are impacting food and water resources, human health – especially children’s – and rising cancer rates.
Lucio Flores, born into an Aymara farming community in southern Peru and part of the National Platform for People Affected by Heavy Metals, will talk about the Quellaveco copper, molybdenum, gold and silver mine – majority owned by UK-registered Anglo American. Estela Rojas will talk about lead and arsenic pollution affecting communities in the area of the massive Antamina copper mine in Ancash – a joint venture of BHP, Glencore, Teck Resources and Mitsubishi Corporation.
Jaime Borda, a specialist in mining, human rights and eco-territorial conflicts is Executive Secretary of the Red Muqui network which supports communities affected by mining, while Beatriz Cortez is a constitutional and human rights lawyer with the network. They will explain the pressures they, and the communities they support, have come under in recent times. As civic space shrinks, any criticism of mining policy is seen as subversive, and environmental defenders are criminalised.
Their visit comes at a time when the UK Government has just published its long-awaited Critical Minerals Strategy update – with plans to expand and diversify its sourcing of key energy transition materials, including copper, of which Peru is the world’s third largest producer.
The four visiting human rights defenders will be meeting with UK parliamentarians for a private round table, with a focus on responsible business conduct and due diligence.
The public event on 1 December will be accompanied by an exhibition – Cartographies of extraction and waste in the energy transition: Teaching strategies to support community resistance in Latin America.