Amazon Watch

Land Rights

2026: A Year of Decision for the Amazon

The Amazon has reached an ecological tipping point. What happens in 2026 will help determine whether climate justice remains possible or becomes an empty slogan.

Hope Is a Practice: 30 Years Walking With the U’wa People

In a time of repression and daily outrage, where do we find hope? For nearly 30 years, the U’wa people of Colombia have shown the world what spiritual, cultural, and political resistance looks like. Their struggle continues, and so does our commitment.

Indigenous Leadership and Collective Power in 2025

As climate denial gained renewed political traction and governments moved to restrict civic space, Indigenous peoples and grassroots movements across the Amazon advanced bold, collective visions for the future.

Small Steps Made, Big Leaps Needed: JPMorgan Chase Reveals Policy Shifts

World’s largest fossil financier responds following Indigenous-led bank advocacy against fossil fuel expansion in the Peruvian Amazon

The changes fall far short of what is needed to prevent violations of Indigenous peoples' rights and to halt large scale destruction of critical ecosystems like the Amazon biome.

Amazon Watch is building on more than 28 years of radical and effective solidarity with Indigenous peoples across the Amazon Basin.

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“It’s Not Safe to Live Here.”

Colombia is deadliest country for environmental defenders

Associated Press | “We have to continue defending the future, and we need more and more people to join this cause.”

This Is What True Climate Leadership Looks Like

Indigenous women and the grassroots Amazonian movement carried COP30 on their shoulders

“We’re very happy that our lands advanced in the demarcation process, but there are so many lands that still need to be recognized and demarcated in Brazil.”

JPMorgan Chase Quietly Adds Restrictions to Fossil Fuel Financing in the Amazon Rainforest

At COP30, experts acknowledge this step and underscore the need for a policy that fully ends financing to oil and gas in the Amazon

“Years of steadfast organizing under the leadership of Amazonian Indigenous peoples have successfully pressured JPMorgan, the world’s largest fossil financier, to take a crucial step towards recognizing Indigenous and human rights."

Major River Mobilization from the Amazon Arrives at COP30

More than 200 boats carrying Indigenous, riverine, and social movement leaders occupied Guajará Bay in a historic act for the Amazon and climate justice. Chief Raoni Metuktire reminded the world of a simple truth: “The forest lives because we are here. If they remove the people, the forest will die with them.”

“The presence of Indigenous Peoples at COP30 is very important, but the struggle doesn’t end here."

Indigenous Peoples Intercept Soy Barges on the Tapajós River

“There can be no real climate solution while Amazonian rivers are treated merely as grain corridors and the peoples of the Tapajós continue to be denied their right to free, prior, and informed consent.”

The peaceful protest was a powerful statement from Indigenous and traditional communities about the impacts of Brazil’s grain export corridors on rivers, fisheries, territories, and local livelihoods.

The Fight Against Climate Change Is Also a Fight Against Organized Crime

Belém COP cannot succeed without taking decisive action

Open Global Rights | Belém can be remembered as a turning point – when the world stopped treating the Amazon as a victim and began dismantling the criminal economies driving its collapse.

Endangered Amazonía

This report, a collection of 22 articles from Indigenous organizations, researchers, journalists, and international organizations, shows forest degradation and fires have not only pushed the Amazon beyond previous estimates of proximity to its tipping point, but that human activity has driven the forest beyond where mere protection of what remains...

Standing With the Kakataibo

Resilience amid Peru’s crisis of corruption and organized crime

The Kakataibo have made it clear to us: they will not give up. Their fight to reclaim and defend their ancestral lands has lasted more than two decades, and this is simply another chapter in a long struggle for survival and justice.

Defending the Amazon Against Illegal Economies

The Wampís Nation’s fight to defend their territory against an invasion of illegal mining

The Wampís’ fight is not just local, it’s global. Defending the Amazon means defending the planet.

The Rainforest Spoke. Amazonian Legislators Listened.

The Parliamentarians for a Fossil-Free Amazon call for a moratorium on new oil and mining projects – starting with Indigenous territories.

In the face of inaction and paralysis of countries in making significant progress to address the climate crisis and its principal driver – fossil fuels – a worldwide coalition of legislative leaders has taken matters into their own hands, demonstrating what true climate leadership can look like.

Ecuador and Oil: A Challenge for Democracy and the Amazon

Since the adoption of the Paris Agreement, more than 930,000 square kilometers have been opened for oil and gas exploration in Latin America and the Caribbean, an area larger than Venezuela

El País | What is at stake is not only Ecuador’s Amazon. A just energy transition must begin from the principle of shared but differentiated responsibility.