FAREWELL TO PARADISE
The hydroelectric dam Yacyretá, on the Paraná River, with its 5 km wall and 65 km of dikes, has meant
the flooding of 500 square kilometers and the forced displacement of more than 40,000 people. The vast
majority of these people are from the mythical Guaraní indigenous race, who as a result of this project
is today in the process of disintegration. The cost of the project escalated and multiplied by five and
6,000 million dollars were embezzled.
Affected people today denounce, both the miserable living conditions they are forced to endure, and the
violent aggressions they suffer at the hands of the paramilitary groups who forcibly evict them by burning
down their houses. They are fighting against the enlargement of the dam, which would mean the flooding of
a further 1,000 square km with 200,000 ha of crops, the displacement of 80,000 more people and the destruction
of the supposedly protected Iberá wetlands, internationally recognized for their ecological importance.
DESARRAIGO. Pawel Wiechetek
Texts: Marisancho Menjón and Pawel Wiechetek
Fotografía: Argeo Ameztoy, Mónica Giménez, Samuel Cossar-Gilbert and Juan Roa
