Deaths as Peru gold miners fight in remote town

Fourteen people have been killed in an armed dispute between small-scale miners in a remote gold-mining town in southern Peru, authorities said.

The incident occurred between June 1 and 2 in the province of Caraveli in Peru's southern Arequipa region, Marco Cuadros, the head of the Arequipa police's criminal division, told journalists on Wednesday.

Cuadros said seven people were found "dead by firearm projectile" in a first police intervention and that on Tuesday seven more bodies were found in the conflict zone. He added that the causes of their deaths are still under investigation.

The violence was the latest incidence of unrest in Peru's increasingly volatile mining sector, following a recent fire allegedly set by wildcat copper miners at Southern Copper Corp's Los Chancas project.

Edwin Martinez, a legislator for the Arequipa region, told the Reuters news agency by telephone that the 14 deaths were due to a dispute over areas where small miners extract gold. Martinez said the death toll could rise as 10 people remain missing, according to relatives.

Dozens arrested 

In 2021, Peru produced 96.6 tonnes of gold, according to the Ministry of Energy and Mines, making it the largest gold producer in Latin America. Roughly 10-15 percent of Peru's production of gold comes from artisan or informal miners, mostly from remote and poor areas.

The Arequipa prosecutor's office said in a statement that 31 people allegedly involved in the confrontation between informal miners have been arrested. 

The miners work on lands held by mining companies Intigold Mining, Calpa Renace and Atico Calpa.

The firms were not immediately available for comment.