Peru ends Lima curfew aimed at quelling protests
Peruvian President Pedro Castillo on Tuesday announced the end of a curfew in the capital Lima aimed at containing protests against rising fuel prices following crisis talks with Congress.
"We will with immediate effect remove this immobility (curfew). We call on the Peruvian people to be calm," said the leftist leader, alongside Congress president Maria del Carmen Alva.
Police and soldiers patrolled the largely empty streets of the capital earlier Tuesday after Castillo announced the curfew shortly before midnight on Monday for Lima and the neighbouring port city of Callao.
It was due to last until midnight on Tuesday as authorities attempted to curtail protests against rising fuel and toll prices amid growing economic hardship.
But news of the curfew's end was met with cheers by hundreds of protesters outside Congress and in other parts of the capital, A journalist noted.
"The people did it!" said opposition legislator Alva on Twitter.
Shops and schools were closed and bus services mostly suspended but many workers, at hotels or hospitals for example, ignored the shut-down, which was widely criticised on social media.
The measure took many in Lima by surprise, given that the most violent protests in recent days took place far from the capital.
Many had no choice but to take a taxi or walk to their place of work.
"It was a very late and improvised" announcement, complained Cinthya Rojas, a nutritionist who waited patiently for one of the handful of buses still running to get to work at a hospital east of Lima.
A hotel employee said she had to pay the equivalent of $8, a small fortune on her salary, for a taxi to work.
Some tourists had difficulty finding food, with restaurants and supermarkets closed, but domestic and international flights continued as normal from Jorge Chavez airport, its concessioner said.
Residents of some Lima neighbourhoods beat pots and pans at their windows in protest against the lockdown at noon.
"The measures taken, like those taken yesterday, are not against the people but in order to save the lives of compatriots," said Castillo, baulked by the first social protests of his eight-month-old presidency.
He had said the curfew move was "to reestablish peace" after countrywide protests amidst biting food inflation.
"There was information from a source that there were going to be acts of vandalism today. That is why we have taken this step," Defence Minister Jose Gavidia said earlier on Tuesday.
