Thousands join "March to defend Mother Earth" in Lima

All morning on Wednesday, about 3,000 activists of different nationalities marched carrying posters and signs through several streets in downtown Lima, creating traffic tie-ups, and chanting "Let's change the economic and social system, not the climate."

The march was headed by the communities and peoples who are being affected by socio-environmental conflicts such as the Conga gold mining project in Cajamarca, in northern Peru, and other social movements from the country's interior

After the march, organizers held a meeting on San Martin Plaza where they demanded that "the capitalist governments, which only think about the Green (Climate) Fund, work to mitigate polluting gases," the president of the National Agrarian Confederation, Antolin Huascar, told Efe.

The Peruvian activist leader said that the march was held peacefully with the participation of social leaders from Central America, Asia, Europe, North America, including lawmakers from several nations.

Huascar, one of the march organizers, said that the main demand of the People's Summit is for their proposals to be binding on the COP20 negotiations to draft a new climate agreement to be signed next year in Paris.

The main issues being discussed at the People's Summit are global warming, low emissions energy sources, agriculture, sustainable management of resources, technology transfer and the role of women in society.