Survival International

Brazil: Amazon Indians hold mass rally to oppose dams

Tue, 13 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

The largest indigenous gathering in the Brazilian Amazon in nearly twenty years will take place from May 19 to 23 in the town of Altamira, Pará, to protest against a series of huge hydroelectric dams being planned for the Xingu River.

Over a thousand Indians from the Kayapó, Ikpeng and other tribes, along with riverbank dwellers and small farmers, will gather to oppose the project. The Xingu is one the Amazon’s main tributaries. The Kayapó say that damming it will destroy their way of life, kill the animals and fish they rely on, and profoundly affect their health.

The Ikpeng people said in a statement, ‘We are indigenous people of the Xingu and we don’t want this dam on the river. We want the fish and the fauna and flora, we want the river to be clean, we want water that feeds us and quenches our thirst. We’re not holding back the country’s progress. We’re defending our rights to life, to our land, and to our way of life.’

In 1989, at an historic gathering in Altamira, the Kayapó and other tribes from the Xingu basin rejected the Brazilian government’s plans for a series of six hydroelectric dams on the river. As a result, the World Bank cancelled a loan for the dams, and plans to dam the Xingu were suspended for more than a decade. The 1989 meeting was attended by popstar Sting, and Body Shop founder Anita Roddick.

In recent years, Brazil’s energy planners have once again focused on damming the rivers of the Amazon, including building what would be the world’s third largest dam, Belo Monte (11,181 MW installed capacity), on the Xingu. In all, 70 large dams are being planned for the Amazon Basin by the year 2030.

Elsewhere in Brazil, the remote Enawene Nawe tribe of Mato Grosso state are also resisting plans to build hydroelectric dams on the Juruena River, upstream from their land. The 420 Enawene Nawe, who eat no red meat, say that if the dams are built, the fish they rely on will no longer be able to reach their spawning grounds.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘Big dams like those planned for the Xingu have long been discredited because of their disastrous effects on local people and the environment, as well as their inefficiency. The Brazilian government must listen to the voices of the Kayapó and the other tribes of the Xingu, and drop these plans immediately.’

For further information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Visit the International Rivers webpage on Xingu

Indigenous contacts in Brazil (Portuguese only):

- Sheila Juruna of the Juruna tribe, (+55) 93 9139 4388 or (+55) 93 9171 5409
- Winti Suyá of the Suyá tribe, (+55) 66 8421 1250

NGO contacts in Brazil:

- Glenn Switkes, International Rivers, (+55) 35 33326809 or (+55) 11 8460 9513 (speaks English)

Portuguese only:
- Antonia Melo e Antonia Martins - Fundação Viver Produzir e Preservar (FVPP), Altamira, (+55) 93 3515 2406 or 9904 8680 or 9951 4030
- Dom Erwin Krautler, bishop of the Xingu and president of the Indigenist Missionary Council (CIMI), Altamira, (+55) 93 9976 1046
- José Cleanton Curioso Ribeiro, CIMI Altamira, (+55) 93 3515 2312 or 9952 0740
- Raul Telles do Valle, Instituto Socioambiental (ISA – Socio Environmental Institute), (+55) 61 3035 5114
- Tarcisio Feitosa, CPT (Pastoral Land Commission) and Goldman Prize winner, (+55) 91 9191 5633

Botswana: Reserve opens up for tourists while Bushmen told to walk 400km for water

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Botswana’s government is this week promoting the Central Kalahari Game Reserve as a top tourist destination, but it has banned the reserve’s Bushmen from accessing their own water.

At this week’s INDABA tourism fair in Durban, the Botswana Tourism Board is promoting Botswana as a top travel destination, and the government has just awarded a safari concession in the reserve to a South African tourist company, the Safari & Adventure Company, close to the Bushman community of Molapo.

But despite the Botswana High Court ruling that the Bushmen have the constitutional right to live in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, the Botswana government is doing everything it can to keep them out, denying them access to water and the right to hunt for food.

The Safari & Adventure Company will need to sink boreholes to obtain water for its guests and staff to drink, shower, and cook with - but the Botswana government still refuses to allow the Bushmen to use even a single borehole inside the reserve. It has instead told them to make a 400km round trip to fetch water. The Bushmen have not been consulted about the tourist lodge that will be built on their land.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘Who does the government think will want to sip their drinks and gaze at the Kalahari sunset while desperately thirsty Bushmen look on? As long as the Bushmen are kept off their land, refused the right to hunt for food, and even refused water, the government’s efforts to promote tourism will be tainted with injustice.’

For further information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Peru: Government drops plans to open up uncontacted tribes’ reserves

Thu, 08 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Peru’s government has dropped plans to open up uncontacted Indians’ reserves to oil exploration. The latest round of concessions, announced this week, do not include any of the uncontacted Indians’ reserves.

The move appears to be in response to a storm of criticism from Survival and Indian organisations in Peru. Survival had urged the Peruvian government not to permit exploration in such areas because it could lead to the tribes’ extinction.

The decision represents a U-turn for Perupetro, the state body responsible for negotiating exploration rights. Perupetro spokespeople had previously suggested the uncontacted Indians did not exist, and that exploration in their reserves would be permitted.

According to reports, a Perupetro spokesperson stated this week that none of the new areas include ‘reserves for uncontacted tribes in order to avoid confrontation with local communities and environmental organisations.’

However, part of one of the new concessions, although not a reserve, is inhabited by uncontacted Indians, and elsewhere in Peru oil and gas exploration remains a huge threat. French company Perenco has recently acquired the rights to work in the northern Peruvian Amazon where at least two uncontacted tribes live, and companies Repsol-YPF, Petrolifera and a consortium led by Pluspetrol all work in areas inhabited by the Indians.

Survival International’s director, Stephen Corry, said today, ‘Perupetro's decision is the right one - from both a legal and humanitarian point of view - and we hope this change of heart is permanent. However, there remain other areas inhabited by the Indians where exploration is still going on. These areas must be made off-limits too, and the companies should withdraw in accordance with international law.’

For further information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

India: Tribe stages mass protest against British company Vedanta

Thu, 08 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Hundreds of members of the remote Dongria Kondh tribe held a protest in India yesterday against the British FTSE 100 company VEDANTA, which plans to mine their sacred mountain. Vedanta is owned by London-based Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal.

The Dongria Kondh marched through Bhubaneswar, the capital of Orissa state, and staged a sit-down protest on Mahatma Gandhi Street, which leads to the state assembly.

Jitu Jakasika, a young Dongria Kondh man, told the Indian Telegraph newspaper, ‘If the mining project is allowed, it will destroy the hill’s ecosystem and will dry up two major rivers and 36 streams. To add to that, it will destroy the livelihoods of 10,000 tribals and the religious sanctity of our beloved Niyamgiri.’

Survival has launched a campaign targeting Vedanta, and is urging shareholders, including major British companies Coutts Bank, Standard Life, Barclays Bank, Abbey National and HSBC, as well as Middlesbrough and Wolverhampton Councils, to disinvest unless Vedanta abandons its plans.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘If Vedanta goes ahead with this mine, the Dongria Kondh will be destroyed. They cannot survive as a people without their land. The Norwegian government has already sold its shares in Vedanta, and other investors should follow suit, or face boycotts over their human rights record.’

Vedanta’s subsidiary, Sterlite, is currently awaiting permission from India’s Supreme Court to mine bauxite, the raw material for aluminium, from Niyamgiri mountain in Orissa, eastern India. The Court is expected to announce its decision imminently.

Photos of the Dongria Kondh available. For further information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Paraguay: Ayoreo Indian dies after first contact

Wed, 07 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

A Paraguayan Indian, who lived without contact with the outside world until 1998, has died of tuberculosis. Survival International has called his life, ‘a symbol of the fate of indigenous people in the Americas since Columbus’.

Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indian Parojnai’s life changed forever when in 1998 the destruction of the Chaco forest forced him, his wife and their children to make their first contact with the outside world. For many years they had lived on the run, hiding from the bulldozers which were clearing the forest.

Parojnai told Survival campaigner Jonathan Mazower, ‘We ran from one place to another. It looked like the bulldozer was following us. I had to leave my tools, my bow, my rope to run faster… We thought that the bulldozer had seen our garden and came to eat the fruit – and to eat us too.’

Parojnai and his family finally made contact with the driver of a bulldozer. They approached his home, hugged him and told him in their own language, ‘Don’t be afraid of us, we are good people.’ The man was terrified, but gave them food and water, and gave Parojnai’s wife his football shirt.

Mazower, who visited Parojnai and his family in 2003 and in 2007, said today, ‘When I first met Parojnai, he was already very sick. But I’ve seen pictures of him taken on the day after first contact and he was incredibly fit and healthy then.

‘For me, Parojnai’s life symbolises the fate of indigenous people in the Americas since Columbus. Loss of his land to outsiders forced him to give up his independence, and contact left him sick with a disease that eventually killed him. The same tragedies faced by Indians 500 years ago are being played out today for the world’s last remaining uncontacted tribes.’

Parojnai did not know his age, but is thought to have been about fifty years old.

Photos and footage available. For further information contact Miriam Ross
on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Read Parojnai’s account of life before contact

Read Parojnai’s wife Ibore’s account of the family’s first contact

Botswana: Government urges public not to fund Survival

Wed, 07 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

A Botswana government spokesperson has appealed to members of the public not to donate to Survival, because of its support for the Bushmen who were evicted from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve [CKGR].

Clifford Maribe of Botswana’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, writing in the Sunday Standard newspaper, says, ‘Members of the public, particularly in the UK, are advised not to make donations to [Survival’s director] Mr Corry and Survival International’s campaign against Botswana’, because ‘donations/funds raised from unsuspecting members of the public drive this malicious campaign against Botswana and his obsession with the CKGR relocation issue’.

Maribe adds, ‘The Government of Botswana's commitment to improving the wellbeing of all citizens of Botswana, including [Bushmen of the Kalahari], remains unchanged.’

Both the UN Human Rights Committee and the US State Department have recently criticised the Botswana government for its treatment of the Bushmen. The UN expressed concern that, ‘the right to return is conditional on providing identity documents prior to entering the CKGR, obtaining Special Game Licences to hunt and that the State party will not provide access to ground-water for such persons.’

The US State Department’s report states that the ‘government’s continued narrow interpretation of a December 2006 High Court ruling resulted in the majority of San [Bushmen] originally relocated from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) being prohibited from returning to or hunting in the CKGR.’

Global: Uncontacted tribes 'at risk of extinction' UN forum is told

Fri, 02 May 2008 00:00:00 +0100

An indigenous organisation set up to defend the rights and lives of uncontacted tribes in South America has stated that the majority of these tribes are ‘at risk of extinction.’

The statement was made by the International Indigenous Committee for the Protection of Uncontacted Tribes and those in Initial Contact in Amazonia, the Chaco and Eastern Paraguay (CIPIACI) at the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII). It demands specific measures to protect the tribes.

‘Given the risk of extinction for the majority of uncontacted tribes and those in ‘initial contact’ in the Amazon jungle and the Gran Chaco’, CIPIACI declared, ‘we urge the governments of the relevant countries to declare the tribes’ protection high priority, adopt policies to protect them, and take effective measures to protect them in coordination with indigenous peoples and civil society.’

CIPIACI’s statement demands that the tribes’ rights of ownership over their land should be acknowledged, and that governments should cancel the projects and natural resource activities that threaten the tribes, their society, culture and environment.

CIPIACI is made up of indigenous organisations from Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru.

Global: Biofuels threaten lands of 60 million tribal people

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Demand for biofuels is destroying tribal peoples’ land and lives, according to indigenous representatives at the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII), meeting currently in New York.

A report presented to the UNPFII refers to ‘increasing human rights violations, displacements and conflicts due to expropriation of ancestral lands and forests for biofuel plantations.’ One of the report’s authors, UNPFII chairperson Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, has said that if biofuels expansion continues as planned, 60 million indigenous people worldwide are threatened with losing their land and livelihoods.

Palm oil is one of the most destructive crops used for biofuels. Millions of indigenous people in Malaysia have already been affected by palm oil plantations, and millions more in Indonesia, where over 6 million hectares of oil palm have been planted, mostly on indigenous territory. In Colombia, thousands of families, many of them indigenous, have been violently evicted from their land because of palm oil plantations and other crops.

Malaysia, Indonesia and Colombia all plan to expand their palm oil plantations. Indonesia has announced plans for plantations in Borneo, projected to displace up to 5 million indigenous people, and 5 million hectares, much of it indigenous land, has been set aside for palm oil in Papua. Colombia is planning 6.3 million hectares of plantations, which could affect more than 100 indigenous communities.

‘If the government take our land, what will we have left?’ an indigenous Papuan leader said in an interview with Survival. ‘If there is a plantation, our land will be destroyed.’

Other crops for biofuels include sugar cane, soy, corn, manioc and jatropha, a plant native to Central America. The Guarani in Brazil have lost much of their land to sugar cane cultivation, while the government in India is targeting 13.5 million hectares of what it calls ‘wasteland’, much of which is actually indigenous land.

Survival’s director, Stephen Corry, said today, ‘The biofuels boom doesn’t just have consequences for the environment, global food prices or orang-utans – it’s having a devastating effect on tribal people too. The companies feverishly promoting this industry have been perfectly willing to push aside tribal people in their hunger for land.’

India: New Survival campaign targets British company Vedanta - mine set to destroy remote tribe

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Survival International has launched a new campaign targeting British FTSE-100 company VEDANTA, whose plans to mine a sacred mountain in India, if approved, will destroy the remote Dongria Kondh tribe. Vedanta is owned by London-based Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal.

Survival is urging shareholders, including major British companies Coutts Bank, Standard Life, Barclays Bank, Abbey National and HSBC, as well as Middlesbrough and Wolverhampton Councils, to disinvest unless Vedanta abandons its plans.

Vedanta’s subsidiary, Sterlite, is currently awaiting permission from India’s Supreme Court to mine bauxite, the raw material for aluminium, from Niyamgiri mountain in Orissa, eastern India. The Court is expected to announce its decision imminently.

The 8,000 Dongria Kondh, one of India’s most isolated tribes, vehemently oppose the mine, saying it will end their way of life forever. Sterlite plans to construct a huge open cast mine, which will destroy a vast swathe of untouched forest, as well as a large part of the mountain itself. The Dongria Kondh have lived on the slopes of Niyamgiri since time immemorial, and are totally dependent on its forests. They view the mountain as sacred, grow crops on the slopes, and gather wild fruit in the dense forests.

Norway has already excluded Vedanta from its national pension fund investments, ‘due to an unacceptable risk of complicity in present and future severe environmental damage and systematic human rights violations.’

Dongria Kondh woman Dandu Sikaka says, ‘We cannot live without our Niyamgiri. We need the mountain and the mountain needs us.’

Rahul Gandhi, general secretary of India’s ruling Congress Party, has also spoken out against the mine.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘People who care about human rights should boycott British companies which dispossess tribal peoples. That means not buying their shares. The days of companies successfully sheltering behind local legislation and carrying on violating international law are gone. ‘Vedanta’, the reaching for the divine beyond knowledge, is one of Hinduism’s core religious principles - what a paradox that a company using the name might destroy one of India’s most spiritual tribes.’

Colombia: Isolated Indians targeted by rebels and army

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

One hundred and thirty Nukak Indians, some of the last nomadic Indians in the Amazon, have fled their rainforest homes after becoming caught up in Colombia’s civil war. The group make up around a third of the surviving Nukak population, and are now camping on the outskirts of the town of San José.

After fighting two years ago between the army, paramilitaries and left-wing FARC rebels in their remote territory, the Indians had hoped that their rainforest home was now safe. Those hopes have been dashed. Many of the Indians fleeing the current fighting have never left the rainforest before.

In the latest incidents, FARC rebels shot at Nukak Indians and forcibly displaced seven families from their homes after a Nukak man was used by the Colombian army to locate a rebel settlement. All sides are fighting for control of the lucrative coca crop, the raw material for cocaine. The remoteness of the Nukak territory makes it an ideal location for growing coca.

The latest Nukak exodus comes after the recent death of the oldest surviving Nukak woman, Ewapa. Her husband, Kerayi, the oldest Nukak man, described the future for his people as ‘bleak’. Most Nukak of middle age and above had already died from the devastating illnesses that swept the tribe after they were first contacted in 1988. More than half the population have now died.

Ewapa died from malaria and malnutrition after fleeing the jungle because of the civil war. She spent the last years of her life in San José, where she was desperately unhappy. She found it difficult to eat and by the time of her death had grown extremely thin.

Survival’s director, Stephen Corry, said today, ‘The Nukak simply want to live in peace, in their own territory. They have nothing to do with Colombia’s civil war, yet the army and guerrillas seem incapable of leaving them alone. Contact with the outside world has brought the Nukak tribe twenty years of misery, death and exile.’

For more information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Botswana: Safari company to build tourist lodge near Bushman community

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

The Botswana government has awarded the ‘Safari & Adventure Company’ a tender to build a tourist lodge near the Bushman community of Molapo in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve.

The lodge will need to sink boreholes to pump huge amounts of water from the Kalahari – but the Bushmen are not allowed to take water from their single borehole. The Bushmen evicted by the government in 2002 won the legal right to return to their land in 2006, but the government is making this impossible by preventing them from using their borehole and refusing to issue hunting permits.

International law dictates that there should be no development on tribal peoples’ land without their free, prior and informed consent. The Bushmen have not been consulted about the building of a tourist lodge on their land.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘The government has the gall to tell the Bushmen to make the 400km round trip to collect water from outside the reserve when tourists will be showering and sipping their drinks nearby. It’s against the most basic human rights and is, of course, illegal – in other words, pretty normal stuff for the Botswana government where the Bushmen are concerned. Many tourists will stay away when they know the background.’

The Safari & Adventure Company is based in South Africa and also operates in Namibia and Zambia.

For more information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Bangladesh: Seven Jumma villages burnt down in Chittagong Hill Tracts

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Seven villages belonging to the ‘Jumma’ tribal people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts were burned to the ground on Sunday by Bengali settlers, with the support of the Bangladesh army.

Jumma villagers, including women and children, were beaten in the attack, and their belongings looted. One hundred houses were destroyed, and the Jumma villagers have fled into the surrounding forests. Bengali settlers were also injured.

The Bangladesh army recently began a new settlement programme in the Sajek area of the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), bringing in new groups of Bengali settlers. The construction of settler houses led to conflict between settlers and the Jumma.

Hundreds of thousands of settlers have been moved into the Hill Tracts over the last sixty years, displacing the eleven Jumma tribes and subjecting them to violent repression.

In 1997 the government and the Jummas signed a peace accord that committed the government to removing military camps from the region and to ending the theft of Jumma land by settlers and the army. The accord offered hope, but military camps remain in the Hill Tracts and violence and land grabbing continue. Abuses have escalated since the declaration of emergency rule in Bangladesh in January 2007.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘Bangladesh continues to want the land, but not the people, of the Chittagong Hills. Destroying these villages is a criminal human rights violation, a massive human tragedy, and comes close to a declaration of war. Only international pressure can end this. Quiet diplomacy has never worked there.’

For further information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Peru: Judge issues statement in uncontacted tribes court case

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

A judge in Peru has issued a statement dismissing the arguments of three companies and the Peruvian government in a court case involving some of the world’s last uncontacted tribes and oil exploration.

The case was filed by Peru’s Amazon Indian organisation, AIDESEP, in order to ban oil companies from working in regions of the Peruvian Amazon inhabited by uncontacted tribes.

The aim is ‘to protect the fundamental rights to life, health, ethnic identity, clean environment, property and ancestral territories of uncontacted tribes of the Napo/Tigre rivers region – rights that are threatened by the exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbons in Lots 67 and 39,’ a statement from AIDESEP reads.

The companies involved are Repsol-YPF, Barrett Resources (recently acquired by French company Perenco) and Burlington Resources. The companies and the Peruvian government attempted to have the case thrown out of court on various technical points, but the judge has rejected their arguments. A final ruling is expected imminently.

Malaysia: Penan picture archive online

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

A collection of hundreds of photographs of the Penan tribe of Sarawak is being made available online for the first time. The pictures were taken by Bruno Manser, a Swiss supporter of the Penan, who went missing in the rainforests of Sarawak in the year 2000.

The Penan are hunter-gatherers living in the Malaysian part of the island of Borneo. Many of the Penan now live in settled communities, but around 300 continue to live a completely nomadic life in the forest. Even the settled Penan rely on the forest for almost all of their needs.

For more than 20 years the Penan have been struggling to protect their forest from logging, particularly by the Malaysian company Samling.

Bruno Manser spent several years living with the Penan, and helped them to draw attention to the destruction of their forests in the international media. He disappeared during his last visit to Sarawak in 2000, and is presumed dead.

Last year, Penan leader Kelesau Naan also went missing, and was later found dead. Kelesau was known for his opposition to logging, and his relatives believe he may have been murdered.

View Bruno Manser's pictures

Botswana: Water for tourists in the Kalahari, but not for Bushmen

Mon, 21 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Tourist lodges requiring huge amounts of water are to be built on the land of the Kalahari Bushmen – but the Bushmen are not allowed to pump water from their single borehole.

The government has invited companies to tender for concessions to run tourist lodges at three sites in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR). One of the sites is very close to the Bushman community of Molapo. The companies Afro Ventures Botswana and the Safari Adventure Company have been asked to bid for this concession.

The Bushmen have been asking the government to allow them to reopen a disused water borehole inside the reserve, ever since the government dismantled it during the evictions of 2002. The Bushmen say they will seek their own funding to pump water. But the government has refused, on the grounds that the borehole is ‘government property’.

The Botswana government evicted the Bushmen from their land in 2002. The Bushmen won the legal right to return home in December 2006, but the government is making this almost impossible by preventing them from pumping water in what is an extremely arid and inhospitable environment.

Survival’s director Stephen Corry said today, ‘The government's plan to build tourist lodges in the reserve makes its denial of water to the Bushmen seem crueler than ever. Some tourists thinking of visiting are bound to change their minds when they hear what happened to the Bushmen there.’

Several boreholes have already been sunk in the reserve in preparation for Gem Diamonds’ $2.2 billion diamond mine at the Bushman community of Gope.

For more information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Brazil: Removal of illegal invaders suspended

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Violence by farmers illegally occupying indigenous land in the Brazilian state of Roraima has led the Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) to suspend a police operation to remove them.

The farmers, who are illegally occupying the Raposa Serra do Sol indigenous territory, have been resisting removal since the police operation began at the end of March. They have injured an Indian leader by throwing a homemade bomb into his home, and threatened others with death. They have also burned three bridges leading to the territory, and blocked roads with tractors.

Brazil’s President Lula signed Raposa Serra do Sol into law in 2005, after a long campaign by the Indigenous Council of Roraima, Survival and other organisations. The area is home to the Makuxi, Wapixana, Ingarikó, Patamona and Taurepang Indians, who have suffered decades of violence and harassment at the hands of farmers and ranchers illegally occupying their land.

Most of the illegal occupants have already left Raposa Serra do Sol and have been resettled and compensated, but a small and powerful group of rice farmers, connected to politicians in Roraima state, have refused to move and have continued to threaten and intimidate the Indian communities. Their violent actions in recent weeks are in response to an operation launched by the Brazilian Federal Police, Operation Upatakon 3, to finally remove them from the area.

The Indians of Raposa Serra do Sol have written an open letter, dated 9 April, saying, ‘For more than thirty years we have suffered the painful process of regaining our land, which we believed the Brazilian State would make a reality, in accordance with the federal constitution, the rights of indigenous peoples and the President’s decree signing our territory into law.

‘We cannot accept that the authorities have waited three years to act, that they have allowed the terrorism of the last eleven days in Raposa Sera do Sol, and that the Supreme Court has even suspended the removal operation. We reject the attitude of the state government, which chooses sacks of rice to the detriment of the lives of 18,992 Indians.’

Write a letter in support of the Indians of Raposa Serra do Sol

Read the letter from the Indians of Raposa Serra do Sol, in Portuguese

Peru: Uncontacted tribes go 'round the world'

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

The threats of extinction to uncontacted tribes in the Peruvian Amazon have turned the tribes’ plight into one of global concern, with members of the public all around the world increasingly aware of the desperate situation facing them.

More than 150 articles and interviews about Peru’s uncontacted tribes have been published or broadcast in more than 20 countries, from as far afield as the US, UK and Spain, Australia and New Zealand, to Brazil, Japan, India and China.

The tribes’ plight has been covered by some of the world’s most well-known daily newspapers, news agencies and radio stations. It has also been covered in many other kinds of publications: from Sunday newspapers to local newspapers, in-flight magazines, specialist indigenous newspapers, and women’s magazines.

The tribes face extinction because of the oil exploration and illegal logging taking place on their land. The oil exploration is being actively permitted and promoted by the Peruvian government, while many of the loggers are after mahogany.

Uncontacted tribes are exceedingly vulnerable to any form of contact because they don’t have immunity to outsiders’ diseases. After contact, it is common for at least 50% of a tribe to die.

Survival International’s Director, Stephen Corry, said today, ‘They may be isolated, but that doesn’t mean that what is happening to Peru’s uncontacted tribes is hidden. More and more people are becoming aware of the tragic situation currently facing them and the determination of oil companies and loggers to trample over their rights and rob them of their lands. If public opinion really is a ‘superpower’ in its own right, as has been said, Peru’s government is starting to feel its might.’

Botswana: Gem Diamonds sink water boreholes on Bushman land, Bushmen still denied water

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Several water boreholes have been sunk in preparation for a diamond mine in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR), Botswana, but the Bushmen who live there are forbidden from taking any water at all from their own borehole in the reserve.

The exploratory boreholes were created as part of the environmental assessment which precedes the construction of Gem Diamonds’ $2.2 billion diamond mine at Gope, a traditional Bushman community within the reserve. The mine will require several wells to supply it with enough water to operate, in addition to the vast volumes of water that will be extracted from the mine pit itself.

Bushmen from the reserve have been petitioning the Botswana government to allow them to re-open a single borehole at Mothomelo, within the reserve, ever since the government dismantled it to ‘encourage’ people to relocate in 2002. This borehole was the Bushmen’s main source of water before the government unlawfully evicted them from the reserve.

The Bushmen won the legal right to return to their homes in December 2006, but the government continues to make this almost impossible by refusing to allow them to operate a water borehole in what is an extremely arid and inhospitable environment.

Stephen Corry, director of Survival, said today ‘There is only one reason behind the government allowing the diamond miners to sink unlimited boreholes and preventing the Bushmen from using just one - the cruel vindictiveness of a government determined to keep the Bushmen out of their ancestral lands, and intent on making them pay for their victory in the high court. The diamonds from this mine will be tokens of hate, not love.’

For more information contact Miriam Ross on (+44) (0)20 7687 8734 or email mr@survival-international.org

Peru: Uncontacted tribes flee across the border

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Uncontacted tribes in Peru are fleeing across the border to Brazil because illegal mahogany loggers are invading their territory and killing them, according to an uncontacted tribes expert.

Illegal loggers are exploring the headwaters of the Yurua, Purus and Envira rivers in Peru, says a statement by José Carlos dos Reis Meirelles Júnior. This region is inhabited by ‘several uncontacted tribes who, in order to defend their territory, are attacking the invading loggers and being systematically killed by them.’

‘The uncontacted tribes are migrating into Brazil. . . At the end of last year and at the beginning of this year, some aggressive, uncontacted groups crossed into Brazilian territory.’

Meirelles works for FUNAI, the Brazilian government’s Indian affairs department, and is head of the Indian Protection post near the Peru border. He predicts that the tribes’ flight into Brazil will lead to further violence, not only with other loggers but also other uncontacted tribes who live on the Brazilian side of the border permanently.

‘What is happening in this region is a monumental crime against the natural world, the tribes, the fauna and is further testimony to the complete irrationality with which we, the ‘civilised’ ones, treat the world,’ Meirelles’s statement reads.

Meirelles appeals to mahogany consumers in Europe, Japan and North America, stressing the tragic consequences of their demand for the valuable wood.

‘Dear Mr Japanese: In your lovely home built of wood live the ghosts of uncontacted peoples who died without knowing why,’ the statement reads.

Meirelles strongly criticises the Brazilian and Peruvian governments who ‘know about all this but don’t lift a finger to find a solution to the problem. All there is are statements of intent and minutes of bi-national meetings in air-conditioned rooms.’

Brazil: Yanomami slam government over mining

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Yanomami and Yekuana Indians from two communities have denounced the Brazilian government’s attempts to persuade them to accept large-scale mining on their land.

Yanomami and Yekuana from two communities, Xirimifiki and Auaris, have complained that government officials visited their communities uninvited in February, offered them presents, and told them they should accept the government’s plans to open their land to mining.

When the officials arrived at Xirimifiki, only 25 young people and one leader were present to hear their speeches, as the rest of the community were away on hunting and fishing trips. Over 2,000 Yanomami live in the surrounding area.

Community leader Rezende Sanuma, who was present when the officials visited Auaris, said, ‘The community did not know about the visit, and had not been consulted about whether or not they wanted to receive the officials or to discuss mining.’

The Yanomami association, Hutukara, said, ‘[The officials] made things very difficult for us, they tried to convince our leaders and to sell the benefits of mining, offering presents. They didn’t even take notes of what we said or what the community leaders said.’

Read Hutukara’s report (in Portuguese) on the visit by the congressmen

The Brazilian congress is debating a bill which if approved will open up indigenous land all over Brazil to large-scale mining.