QUITO, Ecuador (Reuters) - Ecuador declared a state of emergency in five central provinces on Tuesday to try to control renewed protests by thousands of Indians demanding the government quit U.S. free-trade talks this week.

Interior Minister Felipe Vega announced the measure after Indian peasants intensified blockades on key roads in at least eight highland regions in protests that have cost Ecuador millions in lost commerce since they began last week.

"The president took this decision after exhausting all other options for dialogue," Vega told reporters.

The state of emergency forbids public gatherings and marches and sets curfews. Troops earlier this week reinforced security along major highways leading into the capital.

The protests were the latest test for President Alfredo Palacio, a cardiologist with little political backing who says he will not halt the trade negotiations. A strike this month by workers at state company Petroecuador trimmed crude output.

Ecuadorean and U.S. officials will meet in Washington on Thursday for the trade talks. Ecuador's Andean neighbors, Colombia and Peru, have already signed deals.

Indian protesters fear the trade pact will damage their livelihoods and way of life. Since protests began nine days ago, indigenous leaders have threatened to take their fight to the capital but so far only small groups have reached Quito.

"We are going to continue with the protests," Gilberto Talahua, an Indian leader and organizer, told Reuters after the emergency announcement.

The government declared emergency in the highland provinces of Cotopaxi, Canar, Chimborazo, Imbabura and parts of Pichincha, where Quito is located.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyid=2006-03-22T034912Z_01_N21339457_RTRUKOC_0_US-ECUADOR-PROTEST.xml

See an earlier Axis of Logic analysis of the indigenous uprising in Ecuador Indigenous revolution in Ecuador?