AFP, LA PAZ, Bolivia
The Bolivian government on Friday struck a deal with protesting miners, but was still grappling with blockades and demonstrations by other workers across La Paz.Other groups are still blocking access roads into the city, which is also the seat of the government.Police on Thursday prevented the miners from entering the main square by using tear gas, while the demonstrators hurled stones and explosives with slingshots.
Miners march to demand the resignation of Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz in La Paz on Thursday.
Protests against the policies of Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz have convulsed the Andean nation since early this month, and roadblocks were choking routes into La Paz throughout Friday, the national road authority said.Miners demanded that Paz resign, saying he has not addressed their demands, which include the provision of fuel and work equipment.
The Bolivian government has reached a deal with the protesters following “almost 12 hours of talks,” Minister of Economy and Public Finance Jose Gabriel Espinoza said.“We mainly had nine points, all of which have been addressed successfully,” Potosi Federation of Mining Cooperatives president Oscar Chavarria said.Paz won elections last year that marked a shift to the right after two decades of socialist rule.He promised to end Bolivia’s worst economic crisis in four decades, marked by an acute shortage of foreign currency and fuel.Paz scrapped the two-decade-old fuel subsidies that had drained the treasury’s international dollar reserves, but so far has failed to stabilize fuel supplies.Now, he is under pressure from all sides.Schoolteachers, transportation workers, indigenous people and other Bolivians have taken to the streets, calling for wage increases, economic stability and an end to the privatization of state-owned companies.The Bolivian Highway Administration warned that roadblocks on routes leading into La Paz were preventing food supplies from entering the capital. The government has been getting food into the city via air transport.
