Over 100 indigenous people and campesinos assembled on September 24 and 25 outside the Ecuadorian Foreign Ministry in Quito to protest anti-coca crop fumigation near the northern border of Educador in Colombia. The protesters claim that spraying glyphosate, also known as "Round-Up," as part of Plan Colombia currently affects border communities in Ecuador located as few as ten kilometers from fumigation sites. Protestors sprayed glyphosate on plants outside the ministry and showed reporters lesions they say were caused by crop spraying. Glyphosate is a category III toxin; toxins in this category cause gastrointestinal disorders, vomiting, swelling of the lungs, pneumonia, and destruction of red blood cells, among other symptoms.
Ecuador's Deputy Foreign Minister Edwin Johnson told IPS that spraying stopped one year ago, and that the lesions were symptoms of "Amazonian diseases." He said protestors are looking only to gain indemnity and that the issue had been closed.
Paris-based International Federation of Human Rights, however, filed a brief with the Constitutional Court in Quito on September 22 regarding the crop spraying. The brief requests that the Ecuadorian State take action to protect affected indigenous and campesino communities.
"The local population is completely neglected, without any health care, and without any possibility of leaving. The situation is deplorable," Adolfo Maldonado, a doctor and researcher with Ecuadorian environmental group Ecological Action, told IPS. He added, "Local peoples used to turn to traditional medicines. The plants no longer help because they are contaminated too."
