Northern Peru has plenty more to offer than Machu Pichu, Thrifter gives a list of several other sites to see while visiting.

From Thrifter:

However, if you like a combination of archeology and beach lounging then the coastal town of Huanchaco may be more up your street.  Although it is a little further away from Chan Chan than Trujillo, the beaches are wonderful, as is the surfing, and you will still be able to immerse yourself in Peruvian culture.  The fishermen there still use paddling boats (Caballitos de Totora) built in the same manner for thousands of years.  Some jokily call them the first ever surf boards.

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An Ashaninka indigenous woman cooked in the main road linking the central jungle to Lima.

Ashaninkas and Machiguengas, indigenous peoples of Peru, protested against the government’s plans to open large parts of the Amazon for drilling, logging and dam building.

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via Neatorama:

A gorgeous 3D film by Clement Crocq, Margaux Durand-Rival and Nicolas Novali for the “Supinfocom Arles” in 2008. It depicts the antics of a young Peruvian boy, his Llama and a Pilot who goes through a psychedelic experience filled with Peruvian iconography and mysticism. Also check out the making of the film on CGSociety as it details the fascinating steps into creating a 3D short film.

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Q’orianka Kilcher is half Peruvian Indian on her father’s side, of Quechua/Huachipaeri descent.  Kilcher talks about the Peruvian Indian protests and how she’s helping them.

from the LA Times:

Late last week, Q’orianka and her mother flew to Peru, which in recent days has been the scene of violent clashes between police and Amazon indigenous groups, who are protesting the turning over of tribal lands to oil drilling, logging and mining. The clashes have left more than 30 people dead and brought severe criticism of President Alan García, who is pushing to open the Amazon for commercial development, over his government’s handling of the affair. Under domestic and international pressure, last week Peru’s Congress suspended the pro-development decrees that sparked the protests, but the situation is far from resolved.

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Peru’s indigenous people win one round over developers

The Shawi indigenous people in northeastern Peru have many reasons for bitterness, Pizango, who is apu, or chief, of the group, said last week at a roadblock set up a few miles west of Yurimaguas to protest government policies.

“It’s been a long trajectory of abuse,” Pizango said. “We got tired of it.”

He and others had blocked the main road leading to Peru’s interior with tree stumps and rocks and set up makeshift tents with plastic sheeting along the highway shoulders. The surrounding terrain of Loreto province was a rolling green moonscape that long ago had been clear-cut by loggers.

Then, in a development celebrated as a victory for indigenous groups, Peru’s Congress last week voted to revoke two laws enacted last year to further open the Amazon to mining, oil and timber development. The measures had enraged indigenous groups and led to a bloody confrontation June 5 in Bagua that officials said left 10 civilians and 23 police officers dead, with one officer missing and presumed dead.

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/photo_galleries/article6487646.ece

morningyerba:

“The Jungle Is Not For Sale”

Iranians aren’t the only ones protesting these days.

Ever since last year, Peru’s Amazonian indigenous peoples have been resisting President Alan Garcia’s plan to grant corporate access to their traditional lands for greater development of oil, gas, logging and biofuel crops. click onto the link to see their photos.

Read more about this issue here in the Guardian

“…These native lands are the entitled properties of the Amazon people, and to sell them off without even consulting us is a violation of our ancestral rights. This is why we rioted on August 9. Well, how would you feel if all of a sudden some authority came to tell you that you had to get out of your house because a rich company wanted to settle there, and you had to find yourself another place to live?…”

-Saul Puerta Peña, of the Peruvian indigenous association AIDESEP

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via www.villageearth.org

Protests have ended today after more than a week of armed blockades on roads and energy installations. More than 60 ethnic groups have come together in solidarity leaving behind their political divisions and organizational alliances to form a unified front against the state and the allied oil companies. The President of ODDPIAP (Organization for the Defense and Development of the Indigenous Peoples of the Peruvian Amazon) has said this is a fight for everything.

“We are tired of being silent against the abuses of the government such as recent legislation passed which makes it easier for foreign companies to buy up indigenous lands in the Amazon. And over 70% of Amazon lands are now in the hands of oil companies. Over 1500 police have been deployed to Camisea, Bagua, and Marañon. Government helicopters have been circling locations taken over by indigenous protesters. The government had declared a state of emergency and had given permission for police to shoot protesters on the spot, but we indigenous peoples think this cause is worth dying for and are not scared anymore.”

Roads and rivers have been blockaded, oil pipelines were closed, oil operations have been occupied, and major industry was blocked from river travel between, in and around Iquitos and Pucallpa, the two major urban centers of the Peruvian Amazon.

What the indigenous front is asking for is direct dialogue with Alan Garcia, President of Peru, and his administration and the repeal of a number of destructive laws. The President claims that bringing industry and foreign investment into the furthermost reaches of the Amazon will bring people out of poverty. This is a clash between two different development paradigms. Many indigenous peoples have already determined their own development path and it does not include the wide-scale exploitation of resources and the industrial take over of their lands.

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tien:

Festival participant, Plaza de Armas, Cusco, Peru

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http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=00e7f4ab-7312-448a-a80a-ab36235b5d28

Satipo, Amazon Basin, Peru—On the fourth floor of the National Museum in Lima, there’s a photo exhibit of Peru’s long “dirty war” against the leftist Shining Path guerrillas during the 1980s and ’90s. A series of wall-sized photographs illustrate two decades of bombings, roundups, secret arrests, and massacres that left 70,000 dead. The exhibit has been criticized for both overstating and downplaying government atrocities, a sign that this era in Peru’s history remains controversial. Just two weeks ago, former president Alberto Fujimori was sentenced to 25 years in prison for human rights crimes committed during the war, fueling a fierce national debate over what actions are justified in the name of security.

But there’s one aspect of the exhibit that seems particularly relevant today. A small room in the museum documents the little-known role of Peru’s Ashaninka Indians, who drove the Shining Path from their rain forest redoubts in the late 80s with bows and arrows and Army-supplied machine guns, suffering up to 10,000 casualties as a result. Now, 20 years later, the Ashaninka are resisting yet another incursion into the Peruvian Amazon, the world’s fourth-largest rain forest. But this time, they’re not fighting Maoist guerrillas. They’re fighting developers.

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http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/global/39910172.html

The investigation into the forced sterilization of 300,000 indigenous Peruvian women is being re-opened, according to the Public Ministry of Peru. This follow-up effort was announced Jan. 7 and will seek out the program’s administrators. It had been part of the larger case against former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori, who is facing other criminal counts.

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