Amazon: an environmental activist murdered in Peru

An environmental activist fighting against the depredation of the Amazon was killed in the Peruvian jungle, the authorities announced on Sunday.

Hipolito Quispehuaman was killed on Saturday evening when he was driving a vehicle for transporting goods on a section of the interoceanic road in the Santa Rosa sector of the Madre de Dios region, according to justice. He was a member of the management committee of the Tambopata National Reserve.

“The preliminary hypothesis retained by the prosecutor’s office is that this murder would have been committed in reprisal to the defense work he was doing,” the local prosecutor, Karen Torres, told the press, who opened an investigation.

“I ask for justice for the death of my brother, this kind of thing cannot happen,” Angel Quispehuaman told the press.

The country’s National Human Rights (CNDDHH) coordinator “condemned murder and demanded that the Peruvian state take urgent and effective measures to protect the life and work of human rights defenders”. “No more dead!” That’s the assassinations it is enough! ”Reacted this body on the social network X.

The Ministry of Justice for its part committed to X to “work for the defense of the victims, so that this crime does not remain unpunished”.

In July 2024, the native environmental activist Mariano Isacama had been murdered in the Amazon region of Ucayali (497 km east of Lima).

Attacks on environmental defenders have multiplied in recent years in the Amazonian regions of Peru, where the presence of national authorities is rare. Indigenous peoples are faced with the presence of drug traffickers and illegal mining which leads to deforestation of the Amazon region.

According to the NGO Global Witness, at least 54 environmental defenders have been killed in Peru since 2012, more than half of whom were members of the native peoples.