Defending the Xingu River basin from the Belo Monte Dam

Last week, on Octo­ber 27 in Altami­ra, Brazil, the Belo Monte Dam con­struc­tion site was occu­pied by 400 indige­nous peo­ple, fish­er­men and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers intend­ing to per­ma­nent­ly occu­py the site and call­ing allied orga­ni­za­tions and move­ments to join them.

Last week, on Octo­ber 27 in Altami­ra, Brazil, the Belo Monte Dam con­struc­tion site was occu­pied by 400 indige­nous peo­ple, fish­er­men and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers intend­ing to per­ma­nent­ly occu­py the site and call­ing allied orga­ni­za­tions and move­ments to join them. The occu­pa­tion was a col­lec­tive deci­sion made by 700 rep­re­sen­ta­tives from local com­mu­ni­ties who attend­ed a sem­i­nar against the Belo Monte Dam held the week before in Altami­ra.

Pro­test­ers noti­fied the Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment about the occu­pa­tion and par­tic­i­pat­ing groups released a state­ment say­ing: “In the face of the Brazil­ian government’s intran­si­gence to dia­logue and con­tin­u­ing dis­re­spect, we occu­pied the Belo Monte con­struc­tion site and blocked the Trans-Ama­zon high­way. We demand a defin­i­tive can­cel­la­tion of the Belo Monte Dam.”

Juma Xipa­ia, a local indige­nous leader, explained, “We only demand what our Con­sti­tu­tion already ensures us: our rights. Our ances­tors fought so we could be here now. Many doc­u­ments and meet­ings have already tran­spired and noth­ing has changed. The machin­ery con­tin­ues to arrive to destroy our region.”

After 15 hours, pro­test­ers were dis­bursed from the con­struc­tion site with the arrival of two jus­tice offi­cials and three lawyers from Norte Ener­gia (the dam-build­ing con­sor­tium), who car­ried an injunc­tion in favor of the con­sor­tium. Upon inform­ing the pro­test­ers about the judi­cial order, offi­cials threat­ened that “Shock Troops” were sur­round­ing the area, ready to act.

This was a sub­stan­tial change from the Mon­day pri­or, when a fed­er­al judge in Brazil stat­ed that the envi­ron­men­tal licens­ing of the con­tro­ver­sial Belo Monte Dam was ille­gal giv­en the lack of con­sul­ta­tions with affect­ed indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties.

The Inter-Amer­i­can Com­mis­sion on Human Rights (IACHR) of the Orga­ni­za­tion of Amer­i­can States (OAS) also request­ed expla­na­tion from the Brazil­ian Gov­ern­ment regard­ing the rights of indige­nous peo­ples affect­ed by the dam, in April. Accord­ing to the OAS, the Brazil­ian Gov­ern­ment is oblig­at­ed to con­sult indige­nous peo­ples who will be affect­ed by the dam, before con­struc­tion begins.

On Octo­ber 26, the day pri­or to the occu­pa­tion and block­ade, Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment offi­cials refused to attend a closed hear­ing con­vened by the IAHCR intend­ed to fos­ter dia­logue toward resolv­ing this con­flict.

A state­ment by groups par­tic­i­pat­ing in what they called “#Occu­py Belo Monte Dam” said this of the block­ade: “The unprece­dent­ed occu­pa­tion of the Belo Monte con­struc­tion site was a direct result of an autonomous and sov­er­eign deci­sion by indige­nous peo­ple and fish­er­men from the Xin­gu Riv­er basin and is con­sid­ered the land­mark of a new alliance in the strug­gle against the Belo Monte Dam. The mutu­al recog­ni­tion and part­ner­ships sealed this week among the seg­ments that will suf­fer the most with the destruc­tion of the Xin­gu Riv­er marks a new, stronger lev­el of the fight against Belo Monte. Such unprece­dent­ed part­ner­ship between indige­nous peo­ple and fish­er­men shows that the peo­ple from Xin­gu are unit­ed to defend the riv­er, nature and their tra­di­tion­al way of life.

Our resis­tance against this destruc­tive project called Belo Monte remains unshak­able. The occu­pa­tion has sent a clear mes­sage to Pres­i­dent Dil­ma Rousseff’s admin­is­tra­tion that the fight for the Xin­gu is more alive than ever. If the Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment con­tin­ues to insist on vio­lat­ing our rights, oth­er resis­tance actions shall come.”

The state­ment was signed by the fol­low­ing groups:

-Coor­de­nação das Orga­ni­za­ções Indí­ge­nas da Amazô­nia Brasileira – COIAB
-Comis­são Pas­toral da Ter­ra – CPT
-Con­sel­ho Indi­genista Mis­sionário – CIMI
-Movi­men­to Xin­gu Vivo para Sem­pre – MXVPS

Hun­dreds of inter­na­tion­al sol­i­dar­i­ty action have also occurred around the world in recent months.

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