Feb 1, 2011 14:19 GMT  ·  By
The photos reveal a thriving, healthy community with baskets full of manioc and papaya fresh from their gardens.
4 photos
   The photos reveal a thriving, healthy community with baskets full of manioc and papaya fresh from their gardens.

Amazing new pictures of one of the world's last uncontacted tribes have been taken by Brazil’s Indian Affairs Department and are used by Survival International as part of a campaign to protect their endangered territory.

This is the first time anyone gets such detailed images of these uncontacted Indians, threatened by illegal loggers invading the neighboring territories.

These Indians are living in Brazil, near the Peruvian border, and they are likely to be descended from Indians who escaped the atrocities of the rubber boom last century.

They live in a thriving, healthy community, with baskets full of papaya and manioc coming from their gardens.

The problem, according to Brazilian authorities, is that the loggers are pushing isolated Indians from Peru into Brazil, and a conflict between the two groups is imminent.

NGOs including Survival, have been campaigning for years for the Peruvian government to do something about the invasion, but nothing changed.

Last year Upper Amazon Conservancy – an American organization, carried out the latest of several overflights on the Peru side, and brought further evidence of illegal logging in a protected area.

“It is necessary to reaffirm that these peoples exist, so we support the use of images that prove these facts ,” said Marcos Apurinã, Coordinator of Brazil’s Amazon Indian organization COIAB.

“These peoples have had their most fundamental rights, particularly their right to life, ignored … it is therefore crucial that we protect them.”

“The place where the Indians live, fish, hunt and plant must be protected,” added the renowned Brazilian Indian leader Davi Kopenawa Yanomami.

“That is why it is useful to show pictures of the uncontacted Indians, for the whole world to know that they are there in their forest and that the authorities must respect their right to live there.”

AIDESEP, Peru’s Amazon Indian organization, issued a statement saying that they “are deeply troubled by the authorities' lack of action… despite complaints from Peru and abroad against illegal logging, nothing has been done.”

“The illegal loggers will destroy this tribe,” said Survival’s Director Stephen Corry. It's vital that the Peruvian government stop them before time runs out.

“The people in these photos are self-evidently healthy and thriving. What they need from us is their territory protected, so that they can make their own choices about their future.

“But this area is now at real risk, and if the wave of illegal logging isn't stopped fast, their future will be taken out of their hands.

“This isn't just a possibility: it's irrefutable history, rewritten on the graves of countless tribes for the last five centuries.”

These Indians are featured in the ‘Jungles’ episode of BBC1’s ‘Human Planet’ (Thursday 3 Feb, 8pm, UK only).

Photo Gallery (4 Images)

The photos reveal a thriving, healthy community with baskets full of manioc and papaya fresh from their gardens.
This is the first time anyone gets such detailed images of these uncontacted Indians, threatened by illegal loggers invading the neighboring territories.This man, painted with annatto seed dye, is in the community's garden, surrounded by banana plants and annatto trees
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