The Peruvian Presidency has apologized for statements made by the President, Dina Boluarte, in which she justified to the international press the lack of agreement with the protests taking place in the main southern provinces, including Puno, where the highest number of deaths have been reported.
«What do we do in the face of threats? Do we let them burn us alive as they burned a policeman in Puno?», asked Boluarte, who has denied that the Government is responsible for the violence and expressed the phrase of discord «Puno is not Peru».
«The Presidency of Peru reiterates that it must ensure the safety and welfare of the 33 million Peruvians, in this context, the phrase ‘Puno is not Peru’ was not a discriminatory or arrogant expression,» he has apologized.
«If it was misinterpreted, we apologize to the sisters and brothers of our beloved Altiplano region. We reiterate our call for peace, dialogue and reconciliation,» said the Presidency.
It has been almost seven weeks since Boluarte assumed the Presidency of Peru after the dismissal and arrest of Pedro Castillo and since then more than fifty people have died as a result of the repression by the forces of law and order of protests demanding an exit and early elections.
Although the media have shown images of the police and army indiscriminately repressing the protests, Boluarte has insisted on the good work of the security forces and has even accused, without showing evidence, the demonstrators of being financed by criminal groups.
Since the beginning of this week, more Peruvian civil society organizations and collectives from the southern provinces have been traveling to Lima, the capital, to participate in the demonstrations. The government has responded by expanding military contingents in these provinces.
In Puno, for example, protests and strikes are taking place against Boluarte, who has responded by decreeing a mandatory curfew between 8:00 p.m. and 4:00 a.m., reports the newspaper ‘La República’.
Currently, a state of emergency has been declared in the departments of Cuzco, Lima, Callao, Amazonas, La Libertad and Tacna, as well as in Puno, where the rights of assembly, inviolability of the home, freedom of transit, personal freedom and security have been suspended.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
