At least 100 miners are trapped underground after an attack at the same gold mine in southern Peru where 14 people were killed earlier this month in a gunfight, it is reported.
A two kilometre mineshaft was set on fire at the works in the district of Atico, Caraveli, in Arequipa, claimed a miners’ representative.
Elisban Mamani Coaquira, secretary general of the Asociacion Calpa Renace, said that several miners were injured from the fire and that almost 100 are still trapped inside the mineshaft.
“Now what we have suffered is an attack against life and health, they have burnt a mining tunnel. We have a shaft that is almost two kilometres long which they set fire to. This tunnel is made of wood which has been treated and has let off a toxic gas,” he told news outlet RPP.
“There were 200 colleagues that went in this morning and they have just rescued 50, 20 are hurt with lung problems - four seriously. They are being treated in the base at Caraveli.”
He told RPP : “They can’t breathe, four of them are serious. There are still more than 100 miners inside and I have gone to the police in Caraveli to get them out.”
He denied that it was a fight between two sets of rival miners and alleged it was an “attack” by a mining company.
Fourteen people died in an armed dispute in the remote gold-mining town on June 8, authorities said.
Peru's mining sector has become increasingly volatile with a fire also allegedly set by wildcat copper miners at Southern Copper Corp's Los Chancas project.
The shootings occurred between June 1 and 2 in the province of Caraveli in Peru's southern Arequipa region, Marco Cuadros, the head of the Arequipa police's criminal division, told journalists.
Cuadros said seven people were found "dead by firearm projectile" in a first police intervention and that then seven more bodies were found in the conflict zone. He added that the causes of their deaths are still under investigation.
Edwin Martinez, a legislator for the Arequipa region, said that the 14 deaths were due to a dispute over areas where small miners extract gold. Martinez said the death toll could rise as 10 people remain missing, according to relatives.
In 2021, Peru produced 96.6 tonnes of gold, according to the Ministry of Energy and Mines, making it the largest gold producer in Latin America. Roughly 10-15% of Peru's production of gold comes from artisan or informal miners, mostly from remote and poor areas.
The Arequipa prosecutor's office said in a statement that 31 people allegedly involved in the confrontation between informal miners have been arrested. The miners work on lands held by mining companies Intigold Mining, Calpa Renace and Ático Calpa.
