Pubdate: Wed, 29 Jan 2003 Source: Reuters (Wire) Copyright: 2003 Reuters Limited Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/364 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine) BOLIVIA COCA PROTESTS END AS GOVERNMENT AGREES TO TALKS LA PAZ, Bolivia -- Thousands of Bolivian troops returned to their barracks, and protesters lifted road blocks Tuesday after the government and farmers agreed to talks over a U.S-backed crackdown on coca crops. Nine civilians and two members of security forces were killed in 13 days of protests in the Chapare jungle region when coca farmers and troops fought pitched battles to control the South American country's most important highway. "Blockades are suspended, but farmers should be vigilant," said Evo Morales, an Indian farmer who leads coca protests and who came in a close second as a leftist presidential candidate in last year's elections. Talks started Sunday, but Morales only began to lift the blockades Tuesday. President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, a key U.S. ally in the war against drug trafficking, wants to eradicate illegal coca. Coca is the raw material used to process cocaine, and Bolivia is Latin America's second largest producer after Colombia. Poor Indian farmers can cultivate up to 30,000 acres of coca for traditional uses to ward off hunger and altitude sickness. But Morales says that is not enough. The talks with the government will encompass other grievances of farmers such as free trade policies with the United States and plans to allow foreign firms to develop a massive natural gas field in the landlocked country. Since the late 1990s, some 50 people, the majority farmers, have been killed in protests amid anticoca campaigns by U.S.-trained soldiers. Indian movements in Bolivia, one of the poorest countries in the Western hemisphere and where a majority of the 8 million population are Indians, have grown in popularity recently. - --- MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager