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Suspected Drug Traffickers Kill Two Peru Policemen in Ambush

by Reuters

   LIMA, PERU --

   Two Peruvian policemen were killed in an ambush Wednesday by suspected
   drug traffickers in a remote Andean coca-growing region, a regional
   police chief said on local radio.

   The deaths came a week after Peru announced security forces would enter
   criminally controlled coca-growing areas for the first time as part of
   a plan to eradicate half the country's supply of the leaf used to make
   cocaine.

   The police chief said the deaths occurred in Luricocha district in a
   region known as the Valle de los RÃos ApurÃmac, Ene y Mantaro (VRAEM),
   where traffickers have formed alliances with remnant bands of Shining
   Path rebels. About 75 percent of Peru's coca is grown there.

   "They were returning from a road patrol when they were ambushed by
   alleged drug traffickers. There were six to eight attackers," Alexis
   Bahamonde, head of police in the VRAEM, said on RPP radio.

   Peru and Andean neighbor Colombia are the world's biggest cocaine
   producers, according to the United Nations.