"The lawmakers who voted today in favor of this project will go down in history as responsible for approving a bill that explicitly attacks the lives of Indigenous peoples in Brazil."
All Press Releases
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Brazil's Congress Deals Major Blow to Indigenous Rights and Environmental Governance
"Brazil's presidency may have changed, but a deeply-rooted anti-environmental and anti-Indigenous sentiment persists in Congress."
Sit-in Continues at Citi NY Headquarters Ahead of Climate Resolutions at Shareholders’ Meeting
“Last year, Indigenous leaders from the Peruvian Amazon met face-to-face with Citi’s leadership, and yet Citi has failed to address their demands to stop financing Petroperú and extractive projects that destroy their homes.”
New Toolkit Guides Investors on Indigenous Rights Respect
Toolkit and website provides innovative guidance for institutional investors on due diligence for Indigenous rights, which is a responsibility of investors and is crucial for climate stability, biodiversity protection, and financial risk management
New York, NY —Today, Amazon Watch published Respecting Indigenous Rights: An Actionable Toolkit for Institutional Investors, an Indigenous-led guide for pension funds, asset managers, and other institutional investors on their responsibility to respect the rights of Indigenous peoples.
State Treasurers and Public Pensions Urged To Support Climate and Indigenous Rights Resolutions at Annual General Meetings
“Public pension fund officers have an obligation to protect their members from both the financial volatility and physical destruction of the climate crisis. They must do their job by voting yes on climate and Indigenous rights resolutions at bank and insurance shareholder meetings this spring.”
Amazon Watch is building on more than 28 years of radical and effective solidarity with Indigenous peoples across the Amazon Basin.
BlackRock’s Big Problem Responds to Larry Fink’s 2023 Letter
“Fink has again recognized that climate change risk is having a material impact in the world. However, he claims that BlackRock shouldn’t engineer outcomes related to climate change. This ignores the fact that maintaining the status quo is as much a choice as taking action.”
UN Human Rights Committee Calls on China for Mechanisms to Investigate and Punish Harmful Activities of Its Companies and Banks Abroad
"Having the Committee recommend that Chinese companies and banks be held legally responsible for human rights abuses arising from their operations abroad is not only a step forward in protecting Chinese investment, but also in guaranteeing human rights in any context of transnational capitalism."
New Research Exposes Rights Violations and Financial Risks with Solaris Resources Mining in Ecuador
Assessment warns investors of mining risk in Ecuador as government touts country as "world’s next mining destination" at international mining convention
Amazon Watch released new research today that exposes the social, cultural, and human rights impacts related to Solaris Resources Inc.'s Ecuador mining operations, and the consequential environmental, business, and political risks faced by the company, its investors, and the mining sector writ large. According to the research, investors should be...
Solidarity With the Family of Eduardo Mendúa and CONAIE
Stop the stigmatization, criminalization, and violence against the Indigenous movement
“Amazon Watch expresses our deepest condolences and solidarity with the family and loved ones of Mendúa, and with the leadership and members of CONAIE. We join their demand for a thorough and rigorous investigation and acknowledgment of the root causes of his death. We consider it essential that Eduardo's widow and children find justice and the...
Brazilian Government Launches Huge Operation to Remove Illegal Miners from Yanomami Lands in the Amazon
Actions began this Monday with support from special forces; approximately 25,000 miners are estimated to have flocked into the territory, bringing violence, disease, and destruction
The Brazilian government has initiated operations aimed at dismantling extensive illegal gold mining activities in the Amazon’s Yanomami Indigenous Land. The objective is to drive tens of thousands of illegal miners from the country’s largest Indigenous reserve after they invaded the territory over a span of several years.
Petroperú Will Seek Financing to Drill in Environmentally Conflicted Area
“Banks and asset managers should know that any investment in Petroperú represents a serious financial risk. The current government is trying to take advantage of political instability to speed up contested projects which have a history of extensive unremediated environmental impacts. The message is clear: the oil industry in Peru is a bad...
Two Brazilian Indigenous Youths Are Murdered, Shot in the Back Amid Conflicts Over Land
São Paulo, Brazil – Two youths, Nawir Brito de Jesus, 17, and Samuel Cristiano do Amor Divino, 25, of Brazil’s Indigenous Pataxó people, were brutally murdered on Tuesday, January 17, 2023, in the municipality of Itabela, in southern Bahia state.
The Biden Administration Must Denounce Violent Repression in Peru
In just one month since the Dina Boluarte government came to power, at least 48 civilians have been killed in the context of social protests, 41 of them as the result of wounds caused by gunfire. Human rights groups have sharply criticized Peruvian security forces, which appear to be responsible for most of the deaths, for using lethal force...
Peruvian Indigenous Organization Demands Denunciation of Massacre and Repression by Peruvian Government
The Interethnic Association for the Development of the Peruvian Rainforest (AIDESEP) released a set of demands of the Peruvian government, international governments, and organizations due to armed violence against Indigenous peaceful protesters
The Interethnic Association for the Development of the Peruvian Rainforest (AIDESEP) has requested that embassies, international human rights organizations, and faith organizations that hold relationships with Peru release public statements condemning the violence, repression, and criminalization of protest in the country, and lack of action by...
In Sweeping Moves, President Lula Reestablished the Amazon Fund and Signed Environmental Executive Orders
President Lula’s decrees reinstated environmental funding programs, such as the Amazon Fund, revoked a Bolsonaro decree facilitating artisanal Amazon mining, reestablished deforestation control plans, and renamed the Ministry of Environment to include the term Climate Change
“After four years of relentless dismantling of socio-environmental legislation, Lula’s new government is beginning to rebuild the fundamental norms eviscerated by the Bolsonaro regime."
Ziggy Marley, Barbra Streisand, Rosario Dawson, and Artists Release Call for a Global Agreement to Protect 80% of the Amazon Rainforest by 2025 at COP15
“The Indigenous people of Amazonia have lived in balance with the rainforest for centuries. Our collective future requires that we listen to the Indigenous voices on the front lines. Amazonian governments and world leaders must protect 80% of the Amazon by 2025”
COP15: Canadian Mining Corp. Belo Sun Stock Takes Major Hit Before Finance Day at U.N. Biodiversity Summit
“Belo Sun’s suspended environmental license, repeated violations of Indigenous rights, and severe threats to biodiversity and ecosystem health in the Amazon paint a clear picture: the market clearly shows that any company or financial institution foolish enough to invest in or acquire Belo Sun would risk its entire investment.”
Biodiversity Can Only Exist With “Land Back”
"As Indigenous Peoples at CBD COP 15, we demand Indigenous-led solutions to the climate crisis and for our rights to be respected. Our peoples are the keepers of Biodiversity around the world. It is through our solutions that we will see the world through the climate crisis."
Belo Sun’s Gold Project in the Brazilian Amazon Rainforest Poses Significant Risks to Investors, Forest Guardians, and Biodiversity, Report Says
Investments in the Canadian mining company can create enormous political, legal, reputational, climate, and social risks for financial firms
Montreal, Canada - Investors may be exposed to severe risks by maintaining their investments in the Canadian mining company Belo Sun, a new report published today by Amazon Watch shows.
Bank of Montreal’s Links to Illegal Amazon Deforestation Condemned by Indigenous Leaders
“While Canada hosts a critical summit to determine the future of our planet’s remaining biodiversity, we came to denounce that one of its leading banks is financing a Brazilian company responsible for untold forest destruction and biodiversity loss, including on Amazonian Indigenous lands."
Royal Bank of Canada Denounced for Financing Gold Miner Belo Sun During Biodiversity Summit
“Today’s action outside of the Royal Bank of Canada is meant to shine a spotlight on how the Canadian mining company Belo Sun poses grave, unacceptable, and irreversible risks to Amazonian biodiversity."
Indigenous Delegation to Hold World Leaders Accountable for Increasing threats to Amazonian Biodiversity At COP15
Leaders from Brazil and Ecuador will be in Montreal to draw attention to extractive industries, especially mining, threatening the Amazon rainforest
Amazon Watch is traveling to 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) as part of an Amazonian Indigenous delegation of multiple coalitions and nations to draw attention to the extractive industries, especially mining, threatening biodiversity loss in the Amazon rainforest and threatening human rights across the biome.
Vanguard Ignores Request from Indigenous Leaders from Peru to Meet on Investment Risks to Amazon Rainforest and Rights
Indigenous and fishing community leaders traveled to the U.S. to highlight harms caused by oil company Petroperú's operations in the Peruvian Amazon and coast
Vanguard cannot continue doing business as usual! We ask Vanguard to adopt an Indigenous rights and deforestation policy because our lives, water, and rainforest are at stake. Until it takes concrete steps, it remains complicit in the destruction of the Amazon and our livelihoods.
Amazon Watch Response to Energy Transition Accelerator: Proposal Repeats Failures of Previous Carbon Markets
“The LEAF Coalition is already failing forests and Indigenous peoples, and this attempt to export its unaccountable, unjust model to the power sector is yet another iteration of the same old story: climate finance that should be delivered no-strings-attached to Indigenous communities and Global South nations is being made contingent on handing out...
UN Expert Group Affirms: “Net Zero” Is Incompatible with Fossil Fuels and Deforestation
Recommendations released at COP27 highlight greenwashing risks of "net zero," while falling short on carbon offsets and human rights
“Credible net zero plans require drastic emissions reductions, direct support for ecosystem protection, and robust respect for the rights of Indigenous peoples and local communities,” said Moira Birss, Climate Finance Director at Amazon Watch.
Latest Draft Shows That the TNFD’s Reputation as “the Next Frontier in Corporate Greenwashing on Nature” Remains Solidly Intact
Almost 18 months after the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) launched, its latest draft gives little reason to believe that the global corporations behind it can be trusted to develop a credible reporting system that would meaningfully shift business behavior on biodiversity.
Indigenous Peoples Call for Global Agreement to Protect the Amazon and Climate by Respecting Rights at COP27
As the UNFCCC prepares to host COP27 in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt for COP27, Indigenous peoples from across the Amazon Basin and NGO allies are prepared to amplify calls for a global agreement to protect the Amazon and climate by respecting Indigenous rights and territories under threat.
Brazilian People Deny Far-Right Bolsonaro Second Term, in Win for the Amazon
In a fierce dispute between Lula and Bolsonaro for Brazil’s next presidency, Brazilians chose the Amazon, Indigenous peoples, and democratic values
In the most important election for the planet, which defined the future of the Amazon and therefore of all humanity, almost 51% of Brazilians chose democracy and elected Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, putting an end to the nightmare lived for the last four years under Bolsonaro.
Peruvian Indigenous Federation Joins Groups Urging CFTC to Rein In Voluntary Carbon Market Derivatives
On Friday, October 7th, a coalition of climate justice, Indigenous, and financial regulation advocacy organizations will demand that the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission investigates and regulates carbon offset derivative trading to rein in misleading claims, fraud, and undisclosed risk and prevent the growth of systemic financial risk...
