The Washington Post says the Maya Train Project destroys ancient Prehispanic treasures

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Construction site. As machinery razes the jungle, archaeologists search for undiscovered archaeological sites on a forced march. PHOTO: Cuartoscuro

The Washington Post claims there is documentation of the destruction of cultural, archaeological, and natural heritage in the Yucatan Peninsula.

A report by the American newspaper The Washington Post denounced that the Mayan Train, one of the flagship works of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, is destroying the Mayan heritage, in the face of the indifference of the Government.

The work, which will have an investment of 15 billion US dollars, puts the cultural and archaeological riches that the jungle still hides at risk of disappearing.

The Mayan Train will travel a distance of approximately 1,500 kilometers through five states of the country: Chiapas, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán, and Quintana Roo. Although for its construction one of the largest and most important jungles on the continent is being destroyed.

The American newspaper warns that the Mayan Train will pass full of national and foreign tourists over hundreds of buried settlements, caves, and underground rivers, which in turn will increase the risk of collapse and contamination. Some of those ecosystems in cenotes are endemic.

The Washington Post warns that archaeologists working in the region have been ordered to search the Yucatan Peninsula for undiscovered ruins and rank them on a scale of 1 to 4, from negligible importance to profound historical value.

Any discoveries of less than four elements will be traversed by the railway or completely destroyed, and the losses so far include Mayan houses and temples that are in the jungle.

The American newspaper details that archaeologists have found 25,000 monuments, 600,000 fragments of ancient ceramics, 450 human remains, and more than 900 caves and sinkholes in the area where the Mayan Train will pass.

The Washington Post also details that just 27.4 kilometers from the Mayan Train tracks, a majestic cenote was discovered and in a cavern, they found a thousand-year-old canoe, which becomes one of the oldest Mayan vessels found.

The American media assured that the work undertaken by López Obrador has two scenarios: take tourists to the cradle of the Mayan civilization, and at the same time engineers demolish priceless relics of that same culture.

Click here to read the complete original article on The Washington Post

Source: The Washington Post

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