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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Dan Collyns in Lima

Outrage over Peru’s decision to nearly halve protected area near Nazca Lines

Nazca lines in the Peruvian desert showing a geoglyph representing a hummingbird.
The Nazca Lines in the Peruvian desert showing a geoglyph representing a hummingbird. Photograph: Simon Shepheard/Getty Images

Archaeologists and environmentalists have expressed their outrage at a shock decision by Peru’s culture ministry to cut by nearly half the protected archaeological park around the Nazca Lines, excluding an area nearly the size of urban Lima, the country’s capital city.

The Unesco world heritage site attracts thousands of tourists to see the vast hummingbird, monkey and whale figures in the desert in Peru’s second-biggest tourist attraction after Machu Picchu. Last year, archaeologists using AI discovered hundreds of new geoglyphs dating back more than 2,000 years, predating the famous lines in the sand.

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