This morning around 10am 14 vehicles with ENAMI employees, accompanied by six police squad cars, tried to go into the JUNIN mining concessions on two fronts;    JUNIN and the Barcelona-Cerro Pelado area.

The moment the vehicles turned around

In both fronts, according to eye witnesses, they were stopped by local residents who started ammassing in order to ask the invaders to stop.

The group of Enami employees and police personnel split into two groups, half tried to go to Junin and the other via Barcelona and cerro pelado. Both failed, and they all met again in the Chalguyacu Alto-Magnolia area to, according to last minute details, go in through another route.

Why, you ask?  Apparently do they can do the Environmental Impact study. With police protection!  Welcome to Responsible Mining, Ecuador 2013.

Luckily there were no physical confrontations and the Enami personnel and police backed off when they realized that there really aren’t just 20 or 30 wild-eyed environmentalist opposing mining in Intag.

Not only that, but the swell of solidarity for Intag did not wait, and came in floods from all over the country.  This is an area that is not alone.  You will hear a lot about this in the next few days.

I wonder if ENAMI and Codelco are getting the message.