[1][2] Following the government's decision to pass regulations allowing companies access to the Amazon, natives conducted more than a year of declared opposition and advocacy to change this policy and, from 9 April, began a period of protest and civil disobedience.

[5][6] Prime Minister Yehude Simon was forced to resign his post in the aftermath, and Congress repealed the laws that led to the protests.

A free trade agreement negotiated between Peru and the United States that came into effect in February 2009 required certain changes in law allowing private companies access to the Amazon for development of resources.

Indigenous tribes insisted that some of the new government regulations introduced by President Alan García in 2008 threatened the safety of their natural resources and would enable foreign companies to exploit them.

In 2008 an oil scandal shook the government of Alan García when audio tapes revealing corruption and conflict of interest were released to the press.

[citation needed][11] The tapes contained the conversations of Rómulo León, an important member of the ruling Apra party negotiating bribes from foreign companies in order to allow them to drill for petroleum in the Peruvian Amazon region.

[9] On June 6, 2009, an additional nine police officers were killed at a petroleum facility belonging to a national oil company, Petroperú, which had been seized by the protesting indigenous tribes.

During that day, over 600 police attacked several thousand unarmed Awajun and Wamba indigenous peoples (including many women and children) and forcibly dispersed them using tear gas and live ammunition.

[2] The government sought to arrest Alberto Pizango on charges of sedition; he is a Shawi Indian leader of the protesters and head of their organization, AIDESEP.

[8] Prime Minister Yehude Simon negotiated the deal to repeal the two decrees mentioned above and announced on 16 June that he would resign "in the coming weeks" over the government's handling of the crisis.

"If there is in fact credible evidence that a radio station has actively supported or incited violence, then the broadcasters should be subject to investigation and sanction, with all appropriate judicial guarantees", said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch.