port of Mejillones, the most direct route to the Pacific Ocean. However, antagonism towards Chile runs deep in Bolivia because of the loss of Bolivia's Pacific coastline to Chile in the War of the Pacific (1879–1884). Bolivians began campaigning against the Chilean option, arguing instead that the pipeline should be routed north through the Peruvian port of Ilo, 260 km further from the gas fields than Mejillones, or, better yet, first industrialized in Bolivia. According to Chilean estimates, the Mejillones option would be $600 million cheaper. Peru, however, claimed the difference in cost would be no more than $300 million. Bolivian proponents of the Peruvian option say it would also benefit the economy of the northern region of Bolivia through which the pipeline would pass. Supporters of the Chile pipeline argued that U.S. financiers would be unlikely to develop processing facilities within Bolivia. Meanwhile, the Peruvian government, eager to promote territorial and economic integration, offered Bolivia a special economic zone for 99 years for exporting the gas at Ilo, the right of free passage, and the concession of a 10 km² area, including a port, that would be exclusively under Bolivian administration. President Jorge Quiroga postponed the decision shortly before leaving office in July 2002 and left this highly contentious issue to his successor. It was thought Quiroga did not want to jeopardize his chances of re-election as president in the 2007 elections. After winning the 2002 presidential election Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada expressed his preference for the Mejillones option but made no "official" decision. The Gas War led to his resignation in October 2003. Escalation The social conflict escalated in September 2003 with protests and road blockages paralyzing large parts of the country, leading to increasingly violent confrontations with the Bolivian armed forces. The insurrection was spearheaded by Bolivia's indigenous majority, who accused Sánchez de Lozada of pandering to the US government's "war on drugs" and blamed him for failing to improve living standards in Bolivia. On September 8, 650 Aymaras started a hunger strike to protest against the state detention of a villager. The man detained was one of the heads of the village, and was imprisoned for having sentenced to the death penalty two young men in a "community justice" trial. On September 19, the National Coordination for the Defense of Gas mobilized 30,000 people in Cochabamba and 50,000 in La Paz to demonstrate against the pipeline.