From fertility festivals to family feuds, from modern crime to ancient waterways, these takes of Lima and around Peru have a unique take on a remarkable country part pre-colonial peasantry and part seventeenth century slavers.
Watering the desert for a thousand years
She looked good in the photograph
Calls for justice over State sterilisation programme
Vulture sky patrol to clean up Lima trash
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it Captain Huggin? The citizens of Lima, Peru have ten new heroes patrolling the city skies with super powers – 150 cm wingspan, ultrapowerful eyesight spotting waste from high in the sky, and corrosive stomach acids that can digest the most putrid meat.
These guardians of the city’s environmental health are black headed vultures, trained to carry GPS systems and cameras, and following their own instincts in unerringly targeting the mounds of rubbish that appear overnight around the city.
Calls for justice over State sterilisation programme
“They falsified the signature of my husband and it does not match his identity card.” says Felicitas from Cuzco. “They lied that they authorised the sterilisation that took place without my consent. I never accepted. They put me under anaesthetic and completed the ligation. I seek justice and truth. Listen to me.”
The events she describes took place twenty years ago, but Felicitas may begin to see justice and truth this month when the State Prosecutor decides whether to send to court the case of the allegedly forced sterilisation of hundreds of thousands of women in the poorest regions of Peru.
Clock ticking for lead fuelled crime wave
Crime levels in Lima will start to fall in six to eighteen months – whoever wins next the upcoming elections.
Between end June 2016 and end June 2017, the wave of shootings, street attacks, house robbery and murder will decline. Whether or not the new president sends armed soldiers to patrol the streets.
It will happen because 20 years ago, lead poisoning on the streets of Lima started to reduce. It will follow a pattern seen all over the world, but apparent a little later in Peru. So buy cheap property in Callao today.
Cusco heritage protest snares tourists
20,000 people marched through the streets of Cusco last week to protest a new law enabling private enterprises to take over the management of archaeological sites in Peru.
Thousands of tourists were left stranded as PeruRail closed the railway to Macchu Picchu “as a security measure”. Tourists arriving in Cusco by bus had to walk from blockades in the suburbs.
“We are not asking for the law to be modified, we want it repealed” said General Secretary of the Cusco Workers Federation Wilfredo Alvarez.