Transport Workers Block Peru Roads In Fuel Price Protest

Lima, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 17th Mar, 2021 ) :Drivers of passenger and cargo vehicles used rocks, burning tires and tree trunks Tuesday to block roads in several regions of Peru, demanding lower fuel prices with a month to go to a general election.

The striking transport workers are unhappy with recent fuel price increases of as much as 40 percent, and higher toll fees.

"What we are demanding is that the government controls the price of fuel at the national level because it is affecting everyone," a spokesman for the protesters, Elmer Culqui, told RPP radio.

Fernando Fuentes, vice president of the National Transport Union of Peru, said a gallon of diesel had increased by 4.30 soles (about $1.2) since December.

"It is now 14 soles ($3.80) at some pumps," he said.

The main roads of Peru's Ica, Loreto, Cusco, Junin and Arequipa regions were blocked by protesters Tuesday as strike leaders waited for the outcome of negotiations with the government.

In Ica, south of Lima, police arrested some of the demonstrators.

The transport ministry said on Twitter that talks with transport unions had started in the capital, Lima.

The protests came just weeks before April 11 presidential and parliamentary elections.

In neighboring Ecuador, an end to fuel subsidies in 2019 triggered the country's worst unrest in decades, with 10 dead and more than 1,300 injured in anti-government protests led by poor and indigenous communities.

Centre-right candidate Yonhy Lescano has taken the lead in Peru's presidential race, according to recent polls, and told AFP that if he wins, he intends to correct what he described as an unbridled liberal economy that enriches only a minority.