Protests and closures will continue as dialogue stalls

After day-long talks, on Monday a group of protesters breached the security cordon and approached the entrance to the Coopeve convention center in the city of Santiago de Veraguas to demand answers from President Laurentino Cortizo and the government-led dialogue ended without any agreement between the unions and officials.

Spokesmen for the associations indicated that the street closures and the protests will continue on Tuesday, July 12.

Armando Espinosa, a spokesman for the civil society groups present at the dialogue, informed TVN that, the three ministers present at the meeting got up from the dialogue table when they saw the protesters outside the convention center.

In the facilities of the convention center were the Ministers of Education, Maruja Gorday de Villalobos; of Commerce and Industries, Federico Boyd; and Agricultural Development, Augusto Valderrama.

As happened last week, hundreds of people protested Monday in Plaza 5 de Mayo.

Meanwhile, the closures of the Inter-American and Transistmica highways are maintained. For example, the international route is closed in the east of Chiriqui and in Los Canelos de Divisa. Another point where the Panamericana remained closed was in the Pacora sector.