‘Uncontacted’ Amazon Tribe Members Reported Killed in Brazil

“If the investigation confirms the reports, it will be yet another genocidal massacre resulting directly from the Brazilian government’s failure to protect isolated tribes — something that is guaranteed in the Constitution,” said Sarah Shenker, a senior campaigner with the rights group.

Under Brazil’s president, Michel Temer, funding for indigenous affairs has been slashed. In April, Funai closed five of the 19 bases that it uses to monitor and protect isolated tribes, and reduced staffing at others. The bases are used to prevent invasions by loggers and miners and to communicate with recently contacted tribes.

Three of those bases were in the Javari Valley, which is known as the Uncontacted Frontier and is believed to be home to more uncontacted tribes than anywhere else on Earth. Approximately 20 of the 103 uncontacted tribes registered in Brazil are in the Valley.

“We had problems with previous governments, but not like this,” said Ms. Sotto-Maior, the Funai coordinator.

Her agency’s budget this year for the uncontacted tribes department was just two million reais, or about $650,000, down from 7.5 million reais in 2014. “What can I do with two million reais?” she said."

Read the newstory by SHASTA DARLINGTON