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LIMA (AFP) — Peru's Congress on Thursday revoked two controversial decrees on land ownership in the Amazon river basin which triggered protests by indigenous groups that left at least 34 people dead in early June.
The measure was approved 82-12 after a nearly five-hour debate in Peru's single-chamber legislature.
A group of some 30 Amazon natives of the Ashanika community wearing feather headdresses and traditional garb led by Lidia Rengifo and Daysi Zapata, two of the national protest leaders, witnessed the vote in Congress.
"This is a historic day because our demands were just and finally the government acknowledged that we were right," said Zapata.
She called on native protesters in the vast Amazon river basin to lift roadblocks that had halted traffic on key regional highways and put an end to the protests.
The Amazon Indians -- some 400,000 strong out of a population of 28 million Peruvians -- have been in conflict with the government for the past two months over half a dozen decrees issued in 2007 and 2008, which they say threatens their way of life by opening the Amazon rainforest to foreign oil and mining companies and other commercial interests.
The protests erupted into bloody clashes June 5 and 6 after police were sent in to clear roads of Indian-manned blockades around Bagua, 1000 kilometers (600 miles) north of Lima.
At least 24 police and 10 protesters were killed in two days of clashes.
The Bagua clashes were the bloodiest since the government's war in the 1980s and 1990s against the Shining Path, a violent Maoist insurgency, and the leftist Tupac Amaru guerrillas.
Zapata also urged the government to lift the curfew and state of emergency rules imposed on Bagua and drop all charges against protest leaders.
Zapata became the national indigenous protest leader when she replaced Alberto Pizango, wanted by the government of President Alan Garcia on charges of sedition, conspiracy and rebellion.
Pizango left Peru on Wednesday after Nicaragua granted him political asylum.
The conflict with the Amazon natives was the most severe crisis of Garcia's second term in office (other controversies dogged his 1985-1990 term as president).
Late Wednesday he acknowledged that his government had committed "a series of mistakes" during the conflict, then asked Peruvians to remain calm.
"The truth is, the indigenous communities were not consulted" on the controversial decrees, Garcia said.
The government agreed to overturn the decrees during a meeting between Prime Minister Yehude Simon and a dozen "Apus" -- leaders of the Ashanika natives -- in a central Amazon village on Monday.
The government's dramatic policy reversal came after pressure from the opposition and international reaction to the bloody crackdown.
Simon on Tuesday said he would resign in a few weeks once the crisis had been defused.