Venezuelan authorities said Monday that a group of indigenous peoples used bows and arrows to attack the installations of a military base in Cerro Yapacana National Park, in the southwestern Venezuelan state of Amazonas.
The attack, according to the head of the Strategic Operational Command of the Bolivarian Armed Forces of Venezuela (CEOFAB), Domingo Hernández Lárez, took place after Venezuelan authorities seized “materials for the destruction and looting of the environment” that would be used for the illegal mining of gold.
“After the seizure (…) some young indigenous people of the region, ‘mercenaries’ who work for foreign mining companies such as garimpeiros, pavers, lumberjacks and bodyguards, attacked the base of the Bolivarian forces”explained Domingo Hernández Lárez on the social network Twitter.
According to the head of CEOFANB, “Indigenous youth, uprooted, are being exploited and used as a shock force by criminal groups to violate the laws of the Republic”.
“The national parks must be protected, it is a duty and a constitutional right,” he stressed.
Domingo Hernández Lárez stressed on the same social network that mining “contributes to the destruction of Venezuelan forest reserves, water pollution, soil degradation and the extinction of national flora and fauna”.
Last Saturday, following a river and land patrol, the Venezuelan army dismantled two illegal mines (El Limón and La Moya) in Yapacana National Park after seizing 19 motor pumps, nine hose reels, seven barrels of fuel and five electrical generators.
According to the local press, seven people of Colombian nationality have been arrested, who were allegedly in Venezuela illegally to carry out illegal mining activities.
Source: DN
