Investigative Journalist Manuel Calloquispe Faces Death Threats for Exposing Illegal Gold Mining in Peru

Sounds of thunder echo on the streets, as rain ricochets off the tin roof of a small blue concrete home.

On a table inside sits a hat with the words "corresponsal de guerra" or "war correspondent", next to a sign that reads "la cara del pueblo", or "the face of the people".

It's the home of Manuel Calloquispe, a Peruvian investigative journalist who grew up in the surrounds of the Amazonian town of Puerto Maldonado, a place that most would have only heard of as a gateway for Amazonian tourism.

I'm not here to talk with him about tourism though. Manuel has been investigating the dark underbelly of what happens along the rivers of a rainforest that hosts 10 per cent of the world's known wildlife species.

Before I get the chance to interview him, he reaches for his phone and explains that he's going to show me a call he received last year. He had recognised the voice and started recording.

"If you publish what you want, you're going to die, you son of a b****. I'll tear the heads off your family. A lot of people are going to die here. Is that clear?"

The recording continues for two more minutes. Manuel tells me it's a cartel figure from a nearby town that has been devastated by illegal gold mining over the past two decades.

He says it's an industry riddled with extortion, human trafficking, environmental destruction and murder.

Manuel was the first person to start reporting "disappearances" in the area, which he says are illegal gold miners who haven't paid the cartel for protection.

"Since I've been investigating this industry, approximately 400 people have disappeared," he says.

Manuel investigated the cartel and their crimes before releasing a report to national media. He then went into hiding for four months.

He says he has received death threats and been beaten for his work, including inside his own home, in front of his children, but he's dedicated to his work.

"I've spent most of my life in great fear," he says.

"[But] I keep doing my job because no-one else will."

Illegal gold mining 'bigger than cocaine trade'

Gold flows downriver from the high Peruvian Andes to the Amazonian region of Madre de Dios, bringing with it many people in search of wealth.

"They don't realise what they're getting themselves into," Manuel says.

Homemade bamboo rafts are tied to the edges of the river, loaded with cheap imported Chinese engines that attach to a large hose used to pump sediment from the river's edge.

The sediment is then sifted, and the workers climb barefoot into barrels filled with gold-bearing mud, before mixing it with mercury, which separates the gold from the sediment.

More than 100,000 hectares of jungle have been cleared to allow more access, and mercury is being dumped into the river and surrounding jungle.

It's painful for Manuel to watch his home be destroyed.

"As a child I lived connected to nature. If it is used sustainably, it's the most beautiful thing there is," he says.

But this isn't just an environmental issue.

As well as the alleged disappearances, a recent study by the Center for Amazonian Scientific Innovation showed mercury levels nearly four times the WHO's recommended human limit when they tested villagers in the area. There are fears this will lead to widespread neurological damage and birth defects.

"People here in the Amazon are dying as a result of illegal mining."

Manuel believes most of the illegal gold is exported as "legal gold", sold everywhere from Bolivia to the United Arab Emirates.

In 2025, Peru's then-foreign minister Elmer Schialer said the illegal gold economy was seven times bigger than that of the cocaine trade, but the government's attempts to suppress the illegal mining have all proven unsuccessful.

Manuel says that there have been legitimate attempts to stop it, but now the illegal industry has more power than the government, which has led to widespread corruption.

"But it's a huge cancer that's going to contaminate this entire territory."