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2 killed as police, protesters clash over Peru copper mine

He added that four others were in critical condition. Ten had gunshot wounds.

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At least three people in Peru were shot dead in a clash between police and locals protesting against a copper mine project in the Apurimac region.

Osorio denounced that protesters are denouncing that the environmental impact study of the mining project was modified and manipulated, hiding the true cons and allowing for the project to go ahead with disregard to health and ecology.

The community leader also said the local population demands that a molybdenum and filter factory and a concentrates warehouse be demolished because they are an elevated source of contamination.

President Ollanta Humala said the clash occurred when protesters entered an area owned by the group behind the project.

Interior Minister Jose Luis Perez said fundamentalists from outside the mining area had instigated the protests.

Humala’s government has said that police resorted to lethal weapons to defend themselves from violent protesters who broke into Las Bambas installations.

Evert Silva, the doctor in charge of the town’s clinic, told VICE News that 15 protestors with serious injuries, including bullet wounds, were evacuated to hospitals in the city of Cusco.

The mining project is located between the provinces of Cotabambas and Grau, and owned by the Chinese consortium MMG.

In January, the chief executive of the company claimed the Las Bambas mine would begin copper production in 2016 and would capable of an output of more than 2 million tonnes in the first five years of its opening.

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Its backers say that once completed, Las Bambas will be one of the top three copper mines in the world.

Three dead as Peruvian farmers and police clash at $7.4bn Chinese mine