Tanks Move in Around Earth’s Most Threatened Tribe

Brazil’s mil­i­tary has moved in to stop ille­gal log­ging around the land of Earth’s most threat­ened tribe.
© Exérci­to Brasileiro

Cross Post­ed from S

Brazil’s mil­i­tary has moved in to stop ille­gal log­ging around the land of Earth’s most threat­ened tribe.
© Exérci­to Brasileiro

Cross Post­ed from Sur­vival Inter­na­tion­al

Sur­vival Inter­na­tion­al has received reports that Brazil’s mil­i­tary has launched a major ground oper­a­tion against ille­gal log­ging around the land of the Awá, Earth’s most threat­ened tribe.

Hun­dreds of sol­diers, police offi­cers and Envi­ron­ment Min­istry spe­cial agents have flood­ed the area, backed up with tanks, heli­copters and close to a hun­dred oth­er vehi­cles, to halt the ille­gal defor­esta­tion which has already destroyed more than 30% of one of the Awá’s indige­nous ter­ri­to­ries.

Since the oper­a­tion report­ed­ly start­ed at the end of June, 2013, at least eight saw mills have been closed and oth­er machin­ery has been con­fis­cat­ed and destroyed.

Little Butterfly, an Awá girl. The Awá have pleaded for all illegal invaders to be evicted from their forest.
Lit­tle But­ter­fly, an Awá girl. The Awá have plead­ed for all ille­gal invaders to be evict­ed from their for­est.
© Sarah Shenker/Survival

The oper­a­tion comes at a crit­i­cal time for the Awá, one of the last nomadic hunter-gath­er­er tribes in the Brazil­ian Ama­zon, who are at risk of extinc­tion if the destruc­tion of their for­est is not stopped as a mat­ter of urgency.

But while the oper­a­tion is mak­ing it more dif­fi­cult for log­gers to enter Awá ter­ri­to­ry and remove the valu­able tim­ber, the forces have not moved onto the Awá’s land itself – where ille­gal log­ging is tak­ing place at an alarm­ing rate and where quick action is cru­cial.

Amiri Awá told Sur­vival, ‘The invaders must be made to leave our for­est. We don’t want our for­est to dis­ap­pear. The log­gers have already destroyed many areas.’

Tanks, helicopters and close to a hundred vehicles have been deployed to protect the forest.
Tanks, heli­copters and close to a hun­dred vehi­cles have been deployed to pro­tect the for­est.
© May­con Alves

Tens of thou­sands of peo­ple world­wide, includ­ing many celebri­ties, have joined Sur­vival International’s cam­paign urg­ing the Brazil­ian gov­ern­ment to send forces into the Awá’s ter­ri­to­ries to evict the ille­gal invaders, stop the destruc­tion of the Awá’s for­est, pros­e­cute the ille­gal log­gers and pre­vent them from re-enter­ing the area.

Survival’s Direc­tor Stephen Cor­ry said today, ‘Brazil has tak­en a promis­ing first step towards sav­ing the world’s most threat­ened tribe, and it’s thanks to the many thou­sands of Awá sup­port­ers world­wide. This is proof that pub­lic opin­ion can effect change. How­ev­er, the bat­tle is not yet won: the author­i­ties must not stop until all ille­gal invaders are gone.’