The Peruvian Government has announced the declaration of an emergency in the National Road Network, allowing the Army to take to the streets in an effort to protect the country’s strategic points, including airports, hydroelectric plants and other key infrastructure, such as highways.
«The National Road Network is going to be declared in emergency, to ensure the free transit of all Peruvians,» said Defense Minister Alberto Otárola as he left the Council of State, as reported by RPP radio station.
He also pointed out that «the immediate protection of the Armed Forces of strategic national points, infrastructure that serves to ensure the life of all Peruvians, has been ordered».
Otárola also informed of the decision of the Executive to declare a state of emergency in the regions of Arequipa and Ica in order to «reestablish public order».
«We have declared a state of emergency today, and it will be published in an extraordinary edition of the Official Gazette of El Peruano, that the departments of Arequipa and Ica join the emergency decreed in Andahuaylas so that the Armed Forces in support of the National Police can take control of internal order», said the Peruvian Minister of Defense.
In this sense, he admitted that the situation of the country at this moment is «serious and worrying» although he emphasized that, with this concern, they have the «constitutional responsibility to preserve the life and integrity of all Peruvians».
The decision of the Peruvian Government takes place in the middle of the confrontations between the Police and the demonstrators due to the protests that are being registered in the country after the dismissal and arrest of the former President Pedro Castillo.
To date, the protests, calling for the new Executive to dissolve Congress and call presidential elections, have claimed the lives of at least six people.
