Mining in the Amazon has terrible effects on the livelihoods and health of Indigenous peoples and frontline communities as well as the overall balance of the Amazon’s biological diversity. Yet, mining giants with well-known track records of devastation and rights violations are eyeing Indigenous and traditional communities’ lands and other protected areas in the Amazon.
Despite committing to withdraw from all mining interests in Indigenous lands, multinational companies continue to bulldoze through communities and their territories to complete their mining projects. Banks and asset managers are once again behind this extractive surge by financing these company’s projects.
Vox | The recent alarming fires in the Amazon rainforest raised the perennial concern of how to protect something that has value to the whole world but is contained within the borders of a few countries.
"Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro certainly deserves the primary blame for the fires currently burning in the Amazon, given his violent, regressive, and racist policies and his explicit encouragement to ‘open the Amazon for business'. But multinational corporations helped create these conditions for profiteering at the expense of the lungs of...
Washington, DC – Amid the unprecedented raging fires across the Amazon, Amazon Watch is turning international outrage into action. Together, with Extinction Rebellion and the National Indigenous Association of Brazil (APIB), Amazon Watch, the leading global organization in defending the Amazon rainforest and the rights of its indigenous peoples...
"These policies are the 21st century version of colonialism, resulting in the exploitation and eviction of indigenous communities from their homes all the while those in California can feel good about their continued emissions at home," said Kevin Koenig, Amazon Watch's Climate and Energy Director.
We need immense national and international solidarity to face this dark time. We are asking for help and support from national and international institutions to ensure that laws, justice and international treaties that Brazil has signed are respected.
The Atlantic | "As long as the state doesn't demarcate, we are under threat of invasions and explorations, so demarcation is our minimum legal protection to avoid these things,"says Sônia Guajajara, one of the most well-known indigenous leaders in Brazil.
Washington Post | Cattle ranchers in the Brazilian Amazon are aggressively expanding their herds and willing to clear-cut the forest and burn what's left to make way for pastures. As a result, they've become the single biggest driver of the Amazon's deforestation, causing about 80 percent of it.
""While the raging fires in the Amazon have rightfully grabbed the attention of the G7 leaders, we must ensure a long-term global response that lasts long after these headlines pass," said Christian Poirier, Amazon Watch Program Director.
CNN | Now that the world is finally paying attention to the Amazon Basin, it's important to also understand that governments and companies around the world are emboldening the Bolsonaro regime's toxic policies when they enter into trade agreements with his government or invest in agribusiness companies operating in the Amazon.
On Saturday July 26, dozens of heavily armed wildcat gold miners invaded the remote Amazonian territory of the Waiãpi indigenous people in the Brazilian state of Amapá, driving out residents by threatening violence. This invasion followed the miners’ murder of local leader Emyra Waiãpi on Monday July 22nd, who was stabbed to death before his body...
The Guardian | Kureni Waiãpi said Brazil's far-right president Jair Bolsonaro had encouraged invasions like this. “It is because he, the president, is threatening the indigenous peoples of Brazil,” he said.
The New York Times | Several dozen heavily armed miners dressed in military fatigues invaded an indigenous village in remote northern Brazil this week and fatally stabbed at least one of the community's leaders.
WhoWhatWhy | "The Achuar and the Wampis communities have an opportunity now to convince GeoPark that this project is fatally flawed, before the company attempts to push it forward and exacerbates socio-environmental conflicts in the rainforest."
Reuters | Indigenous groups in Peru are turning to the courts with a new legal strategy for keeping mining and oil projects off their land, racking up victories that could make it harder for companies to secure permits in the major minerals producer.
Mongabay | "The policies adopted by the current government... violate all our rights and aim to destroy us," said Maria Eva Canoé. "But we are strong, we are resistant. And we are here in this... the 15th encampment, to show to the government, and to all society, that we are alive, that we are resisting to exist."
"This sobering report shows that the time for protecting biodiversity is running out. From the Amazon to the Arctic, dirty industrial development and human greed is destroying critical ecosystems and harming the communities that depend on the land. As indigenous peoples have reminded us for years: our own survival as human beings is fundamentally...
From asset manager BlackRock to agribusiness giant Bunge, researchers have cited a host of the world's most powerful companies for either allegedly financing or buying from groups that have been implicated in the destruction and deforestation of the Amazon rainforest.
A new report from Amazon Watch shows for the first time how firms that fuel the destruction of the Brazilian Amazon under Brazil's new president openly trade with and receive financing from a range of companies and major investors in Europe and North America. Although these producers of soy, cattle, and timber for export have documented links to...
As the world's largest rainforest, the Amazon provides 20% of our oxygen, houses 10% of the planet's biodiversity, and helps stabilize the global climate. The world needs it to survive. None understand this better than the indigenous peoples and traditional communities who call it home, and are proven to be its best stewards. Despite their...
Thousands of indigenous people have descended on Brazil's capital Brasília to protest against a widespread assault on indigenous rights and territories by the government of the far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro.
As widely reported by international media, former Peru president Alan García died earlier today after shooting himself at home prior to his arrest for allegedly taking bribes from Brazilian company Odebrecht during his presidency.
"The Shiwiar, Sapara and Kichwa nationalities of Kawsak Sacha decide to leave the oil in the subsoil and declare their territories intangible in perpetuity, where it is forbidden to extract non-renewable natural resources. The governments in turn must respect this decision."
If there is hope for the rainforest, and for countries where authoritarians threaten democracy and progressive agendas, it lies in the determination and power of civil society activists like Sônia Guajajara.
"A united people will never be defeated!" shouted Maria Betânia Mota, as the indigenous assembly in a partially burned-out agricultural college began. Hundreds of voices roared back in approval.
In the remote, roadless rainforest territories along the border between Ecuador and Peru, over a dozen indigenous nationalities have launched an initiative to permanently protect about 60 million acres from industrial extraction and stop the drivers of deforestation. Dubbed the Amazon Sacred Headwaters, the initiative seeks to present a united...
The Shuar Indigenous people of Ecuador's southeastern Amazon-Andean corridor took legal action against the government today in Quito over multiple violations of their collective rights related to the San Carlos Panantza mining project.
Mr. Bolsonaro's rise to power will test companies' promises to be responsible. Will leading global agribusiness companies be complicit in Mr. Bolsonaro's assault on the Amazon and its people, thus sacrificing their commitments, their reputation and our climate? And will financial institutions like BlackRock heed their own calls for companies to...
"There will be an increase in deforestation and violence against indigenous people," said Dinaman Tuxá, the executive coordinator of the Articulation of Indigenous People of Brazil. "Indigenous people are defenders and protectors of the environment."
"The coming months will prove pivotal in demonstrating the ability of Brazilian social movements and their allies around the world to forestall President Bolsonaro's most destructive policy proposals. As such, Amazon Watch is redoubling its work in solidarity with our embattled partners to push back against an agenda that portends dire...
Amazon Allies is our incredible community of monthly sustainers. A monthly gift to Amazon Watch is a powerful way to be part of the Indigenous-led movement for the Amazon!
