“Peru: Land at last for families of murdered Ashéninka Indians”

Ashéninka Indians in Peru have obtained title of their ancestral land on the anniversary of the murders of four of their most prominent leaders. Edwin Chota, Jorge Ríos Pérez, Leoncio Quinticima Melendez and Francisco Pinedo were murdered by illegal loggers near their home in the eastern Peruvian Amazon on 1 September 2014. Three men have been charged for the murders of the indigenous leaders, but a further three suspects have not yet been arrested. The Ashéninka have been fighting for their right to their ancestral land for more than ten years. Community members have received numerous death threats from loggers who have invaded their land.