MEXICO CITY (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th December, 2019) Anti-government rallies of unhappy Colombian citizens continued on Wednesday in nine cities across the country, and protests in the capital of Bogota were led by groups of indigenous people.
"We joined the student movement, therefore, just like them, we demand the fulfillment of obligations by the government. We stand for peace and autonomy of our territories, but they continue to kill us [unarmed native Indian patrols are regularly killed in reservations during clashes with drug gangs]," John Freddy, a spokesman for the indigenous people living in the Valle del Cauca department, told El Tiempo newspaper.
According to media estimates, about 5,000 Colombian Indians joined the protests in Bogota, which have been ongoing for two weeks. A number of high-speed ground transport stations stopped working in the city center.
A new wave of protests in the country rose after Tuesday's failed negotiations between the government of Ivan Duque Marquez and the organizing committee of the protests.
Despite the weakening of the tax regime adopted by the government along with other social measures to reduce tensions in society, the organizing committee, in which trade union representatives play a prominent role, declared that the government was unwilling to respond to their demands and called for continued action.
Trade unions are the main driving force behind protests in the second most important city of Medellin. Rallies also take place in Cartagena, Tunja, Manizales, Cali, Barranquilla, Villavicencio and Barrancabermeja.
Hundreds of thousands of people took part in protests in Colombia over the past two weeks, a number of cities were plunged into chaos. Five people were killed and hundreds were injured. Citizens protested against economic policies and inaction of the authorities in the fight against crime.
The government of Colombia fears that the protests could go according to the scenario of neighboring countries, where riots caused human casualties and serious economic damage. On the eve of the protests, the migration service closed land and river borders, the government announced emergency measures, which included a ban on carrying weapons, limiting the sale and consumption of alcohol, and announced the possibility of curfews.
