Drug traffickers, illegal miners and dissidents: The triple alliance devastating the Amazon

Drug traffickers, illegal miners and dissidents: The triple alliance devastating the Amazon

When the coca leaf in the Peruvian Amazon turns dark green, the Indigenous people who live in communities scattered over the thick jungle on the Colombian side of the Amazon River already know what is coming. It is harvest time. That means that several Peruvian “managers” cross the river — which is the border there, and for 110 kilometers (68 miles) — in small boats to pick up those who are willing to scrape the leaf. They take them through the same waters and then accompany them on a four- or five-hour walk, on trails that go from towns like Iceland, Santa Rosa, or Bellavista, to farms that combine hectares full of coca crops with kitchens where they apply chemistry to the crop. “The Peruvian authorities know that we are going to pass through. The danger is not there,” says Víctor, a 47-year-old Colombian Indigenous man using a pseudonym, who remembers having made at least five trips since 2020.

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