Number 262, February 12, 1997.

SOCIAL QUESTIONS

- Life on the streets.

The following is a reflection prepared by a group of waste paper collectors who work on Nioac Street in the center of Sao Paulo. All the group members are homeless and live on the streets. It is a translation of the original published in the 'O Trecheiro' of November - December 1996.

The country is going through a very difficult period. Unemployment is on the increase. The number of women, men and children living on the streets is increasing every day. It is necessary to help these companions to organize themselves, to form groups, to encourage them to help each other and to ensure that they do not become unemployed.

There are bar owners who do not allow us to use the bathroom because we may be a little dirty. But if we are pushing carts and gathering paper what do they expect? That we show wear a suit and tie?

When we become ill we die on the streets because the hospitals do not want to take us in. If we go to a doctor he gives us a prescription for medication. But we have no money to buy medication and the health centers will not give it to us. Even if we succeed in getting the medication what use is there in taking it and then sleeping out in the open.

Our children cannot study because we do not have a fixed address which we can register with the schools. For the same reason they cannot go to the creches. Even if it were possible that they could go to the creche, they would spent the day there nice and clean and afterwards come back here to sleep in the middle of this dirt. We would really love to live as human beings should but it is difficult to leave this dog's life.

If we could rent a little clean room just for ourselves that would be something. But what we earn is scarcely enough to pay for what we eat. For those of us who manage to pay for a room, it is in a tenement where we live piled up on top of each other with only one bathroom and one wash-basin for everyone. You likely would kill yourself working just to pay for a small room and the rent collector will probably accuse you of not having paid rent. It's hell. It's better live under a bridge because the dirt is the same as in a tenement and at least under the bridge you pay nothing.

Most of us eat what we find thrown away at the markets. Sometimes we manage to get left-overs in restaurants. If you were to buy meals in the bars you could only eat once a day at most. The government should buy the food directly from those who plant and sell it cheaper to us. We are not looking for free food. We only want it at a price we can afford.

We kill ourselves working and sell paper for next to nothing to the owner of the deposit. He earns a fortune at our cost without any effort. At times we are working and the municipal truck comes by and confiscates our cart. There are deposit owners who own three or four trucks. These go round at night picking up paper and so take the food out of our mouths. It is not enough to exploit us with the price which they pay for the paper; on top of this they take away the paper we would collect with their trucks. There should be a way in which we could sell the paper without having to do so to the deposits. They become rich at our expense. Nearby there is a sports complex where our children cannot play because they live on the streets. The children of the rich families taunt our children with offensive names. Children aren't to blame because they do not understand what they are doing. It is the parents who teach their children to use these offensive words.

We have enormous difficulty in putting our documents in order. We go to the social assistant and we only manage to have our photo taken. If we want to get all our documents in order we need to spend fifteen days without working and in this way one would die of hunger. There needs to be a place where it is easier to put all one's documentation in order.

Many people complain that we are dirty but they don't notice that when we are collecting waste-paper we are cleaning up the city. We may be dirty but the city is clean. If there were more places where we could take a shower and wash our clothes we would not be dirty.

Many times there are people who say that we should look for employment and work but when we are collecting waste paper we are already working. What we need is that we be treated as humans and not as animals. What we need is support so that we can work better, earn better and live as human beings.

We are often called 'drunkards' and 'no-goods'. If we drink it is to forget illness and hunger. This causes us to become more ill and hungry. For those who do not have a life like ours it is easy to talk. Come and live with us, experience hunger and sleep on the streets to see if it is good. Since we have rights to nothing we are forced to live in our own world. We should be a little more respected. This would be better for everybody. Once, functionaries of the mayor's office demolished the huts we had built under the bridge and brought us all to a village far away from the city. When we arrived there there was only an empty lot. We couldn't work because there was no waste paper to collect. We were at our wit's end to know what would happen. Soon there was a shortage of food and everything else. We came to the conclusion that they were only trying to fool us and so we returned to the city center where we could earn something.

HEALTH ISSUES

- Number of AIDS cases 38.9% higher than expected.

The number of people with AIDS registered in 1996 was 38.9% higher than expected. The Ministry for Health had estimated that 36 thousand would be registered during the year; instead the number was 50 thousand. According to the evaluation of the Ministry, the significant increase is due to the fact that free medication was offered last year to AIDS sufferers. Many who normally would not want to be registered came forward so as to receive the medication.

"Nobody calculated that there were so many un-notified cases. Many who were receiving treatment as private patients and had not notified the health authorities of their disease were forced to identify themselves" commented Pedro Chequer, coordinator of the federal government's AIDs program. Mr. Chequer suspects that there are other people in this position who will identify themselves in the coming months.

In the State of Sao Paulo are found 17 of the 20 cities in the country with the largest number of people suffering from AIDS according to figures for last November published recently. On a national level, the city of Itajai in the State of Santa Catarina has the largest concentration of people suffering from AIDS (545.1 people per 100 thousand inhabitants). Santos in the State of Sao Paulo finds itself in second place - 483.8 per 100 thousand. Following Santos comes a number of cities in the State of Sao Paulo - Sao Jose do Rio Preto (389.8 per 100 thousand), Bebedouro (373.8 per 100 thousand) and Catanduva(322.5 per 100 thousand).

(Source: 'Folha de Sao Paulo' January 31 and February 06)

- Leprosy on the increase in northern Brazil.

The number of people suffering from leprosy is on the increase especially in the northern states of Brazil according to a report in the 'Folha de Sao Paulo' on February 12. At the moment there are approximately 167 thousand known cases of the disease and 36 thousand new cases are registered each year. On a world scale Brazil finds itself in second place for the number of people affected by the disease. In first place is India with approximately 500 thousand people suffering from leprosy.

Health authorities forecast that the number of cases in Brazil will increase. This increase is in large part provoked by at least two factors - irregularity in the distribution of medicines to those suffering from the disease and lack of correct diagnosis. According to the 'Folha' report,the World Health Organization had hoped that by the year 2000 Brazil would have less than one case of leprosy per 10 thousand inhabitants. The national average at the moment is 8.82 people with the disease per 10 thousand. However, in the northern states the ratio is more than 20 per 10 thousand. The State of Amazonia is where the disease is most widespread in Latin America. There the ratio is 32 per 10 thousand.

INDIGENOUS ISSUES

DEHUMANISING GROWTH

The Cost of Brazil's Stabilization: Eroding Indians' Rights

Oxfam UK and Ireland Policy Briefing

February 1997

Summary

President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who is visiting the UK and Italy in the second week of February 1997, is likely to encounter more hard questioning about the direction of the Brazilian Government's Indian policy. In Britain President Cardoso will attend a special celebration at Canning House. In Italy he has a formal programme, including a meeting with the Pope.

Though the President's economic stabilization programme enjoys widespread popularity in Brazil for almost eliminating inflation and raising the incomes of the low-paid, his government is criticised for the low priority it gives to health and education, and the growing unemployment caused by the opening of Brazil to foreign imports. Among the vulnerable groups at risk from this 'trickle down' model of development are Brazil's indigenous peoples, to whom Brazil has obligations under its Constitution and under international agreements. As Brazil reviews achievements since the Earth Summit five years ago, Brazil's Indians have little to celebrate. Their traditional lands, such as the area of Raposa Serra do Sol, in Brazil's northernmost state, Roraima, continue to be reduced to satisfy the demands of mining and ranching interests, and lack of investment in Indian health care has caused a dramatic increase in deaths.

Oxfam and other European agencies are calling on the President to revoke a recent decision to reduce the Indian Area of Raposa/Serra do Sol, home to over 9,000 Indians, by 200,000 hectares. The reduction of the area has been compounded by an agreement, which violates the Brazilian Constitution, authorizing five mining enclaves inside the area. The respected Brazilian NGO, ISA (the Instituto Socio-Ambiental, the Socio- Environmental Institute), has warned that this decision sows the seeds for further environmental contamination and violence.

The reduction of Indian area has been the result of modifications to the demarcation procedures introduced over one year ago by President Cardoso in Decree 1775. European governments who are contributing to Brazil's Pilot Programme to Preserve the Brazilian Rain Forest, were assured that the decree would make the demarcation process more efficient and transparent. Decisions would be made not on political but technical grounds - but Marcio Santilli, the former head of FUNAI (the Brazilian Federal Government's Indian Agency), has publicly stated that there is no legal or technical justification for the reduction of the area. It is true that the Brazilian government has not reduced Indian areas already fully demarcated and recorded in land registries, but the Raposa/Serra do Sol case indicates that there is no political will to protect all the Indian areas that have yet to be formally demarcated. Decree 1775, if implemented in this political way, may lead to the reduction of about 200 other Indian areas which have been demarcated but not registered, and about 140 others which are in the process of demarcation.

The Agencies propose that the donor community can play a positive role in: entering into urgent discussions with the Brazilian Federal Government about the implementation of Decree 1775; expressing concern about the conflict of this measure with the rights of Brazil's Indians; and examining what the implications are for World Bank, EU and G-7 funded programmes in Brazil. There needs to be an urgent review involving NGOs and representatives of Indian communities with the donors regarding the feasibility of continuing a range of environmental and Indian projects in Brazil.

Introduction

On the eve of the President of Brazil's visit to Europe, Oxfam and other British agencies warn that Indian rights are being eroded as Fernando Henrique Cardoso seeks to secure support in Congress for his bid to stand for re-election in 1998 (a constitutional amendment, approved on first reading by the Lower House, will break with Brazilian tradition and allow the president, state governors and mayors to stand for a second consecutive term of office). President Cardoso's efforts to reform the Brazilian economy have brought him a lot of international admiration. He has written about the need to humanize growth with equity and argued that the concept of development has "to include the protection of human, ecological and social rights". In practice his government has done disappointingly little to alter the tradition of successive Brazilian administrations: that of promoting economic growth while exacerbating social inequality. The interests of vulnerable groups have been neglected in favour of maintaining incentives which privilege those with capital and influence.

Brazil's Macro-Economic Policies

Current policies have done little to redress the gross inequalities in Brazil, which has some of the worst social indicators among the group of 22 middle income countries. Despite some recent improvements, over 30 million Brazilians still live in absolute poverty. According to the World Bank's 1995 Brazil: A Poverty Assessment, the distribution of the benefits of public social spending in Brazil is 'pro-rich': the bottom 20 per cent of the population received only 13 per cent of total benefits, compared to 24 per cent for the top 20 per cent. The country also has one of the smallest percentages of government spending on health and education in relation to total expenditure (5.2% and 3.6% respectively). Despite this, 77 per cent of the resources allocated in the 1996 budget for basic sanitation and preventive medicine were not released, and these sectors will have to wait for the revenue generated by a tax on bank transactions, which did not come into force until January 1997. In Brazil, the poorest 10% of the population receive 1.1% of the national income, whereas the richest 10% receive 48%. In the 1995 budget, despite these disparities, the Federal Government substantially reduced public expenditure for many social sectors. Food programmes were reduced by 6 per cent. Support for basic education was reduced by over 15 per cent. Income and employment generation schemes were reduced by over 40 per cent; and only 43.4 per cent of the 1995 'budget for children' was spent (a range of spending monitored by UNICEF which benefits children and adolescents). Social welfare schemes, particularly support programmes for children and adolescents, have been reduced by a massive 83 percent. Against this background, Brazil's leading anti-poverty campaigner, Herbert de Souza, publicly withdrew his support from the government's flagship social programme, Solidarity Community.

Human Rights in Brazil

Despite the Brazilian Government's publication of a National Human Rights Programme, with a section on Indians, and despite improvements to the agrarian reform process, violence against indigenous communities and settlers continues unabated: seven rural workers were killed by landowners' gunmen in the first 16 days of 1997.

A report published in November 1996 by the Catholic Church's Indian Missionary Council - CIMI, [A violencia contra os povos indigenas no Brasil, 1994-95] carefully documents cases of assault and killings of Indians arising from conflict over land and provides alarming statistics on the levels of illness and malnutrition affecting the Indian population as a whole. In 1996, if anything, the situation deteriorated: the Indian population is facing increasing levels of violence, often as a direct result of the insidious impact of Decree 1775. At the same time, government cuts in social spending have left vulnerable Indian communities in a state of almost total neglect. A 1995 hunger survey found that 34% of the Indian population suffered from malnutrition. At the end of 1996 the National Health Foundation had no money left for work in Indian communities, and health workers were told that they would have to wait for the proceeds of the new tax on banking transactions before funding could resume.

Decree 1775

A year ago there was widespread international protest about the impact of a new law, Decree 1775, which opened up the majority of Brazil's Indian lands to claims by interested parties, including loggers, mining companies, ranchers and local municipalities. One of the major objections to the Decree was that it encouraged counter-claims by third parties to Indian land, despite the fact that under Brazil's Constitution all such claims and titles are null and void. The predictable result has been to increase pressure to reduce all Indian lands from powerful regional elites and logging, mining and agribusiness interests, who have consistently attempted to halt or obstruct the demarcation process.

On 15 February 1996 the European Parliament passed a resolution criticizing Brazil for undermining the rights of its Indian population. This prompted the Minister of Justice, Nelson Jobim, the architect of the decree, to undertake a whirlwind tour of European capitals the following month to reassure public opinion. During his visit to London, Mr Jobim met MPs and senior government officials and over 40 British NGOs working in the field of human rights, the environment and development. He presented the new law as a means of securing, not undermining, Indian rights. Mr. Jobim's claims were designed to calm fears that funds from British ODA, the World Bank, the EU and the German Government for a range of projects in Brazil concerned with environmental protection and support to indigenous communities were being thrown away. But the sincerity of these assurances must be judged in light of the events over the past year.

International Support for Brazil's Pilot Programme

In September 1996, at the Third Annual Meeting of the Participants of the Pilot Programme to conserve the Brazilian Rain Forest (a US$250 million programme financed by G-7 countries, notably Germany, and by the EU and the Netherlands, which aims to help slow deforestation in the Amazon), the Brazilian representatives claimed that there was "clear evidence that there is broadening political support in Brazil" for protecting its tropical forests. At that meeting the donors and the Brazilian Government representatives reaffirmed the importance of protecting Brazilian indigenous areas. The Indigenous Lands Project of the Pilot Programme is currently financing indigenous land demarcations with $2.5 million from core funding and DM 30 million through the German bilateral agreement. The EU announced that it would provide an additional 11 million ECU and is considering further funding for 1997. But continued donor support for such joint initiatives must be questioned when there appears to be a serious dereliction on the part of the Brazilian Government of its duties and obligations towards its indigenous population. The donors need to request stronger safeguards that the rights of Brazil's Indians will be protected and enforced.

The Brazilian Government's claims

Decree 1775 would make the demarcation process more efficient and legally more secure, and not reduce the area legally recognised by the government as Indian land;

Decisions to alter the boundaries of Indian areas would be taken purely on technical grounds

- e.g. if the anthropological surveys were at fault or if errors had occurred in the mapping exercise;

Illegal occupation of Indian lands would remain illegal and steps would be taken to remove miners, loggers and settlers from Indian areas. The Minister announced that a special military operation would be undertaken to remove the illegal gold prospectors from the Yanomami territory.

The Facts

The Decree has not removed legal threats to demarcations carried out under it. The Brazilian Supreme Court has refused to dismiss the legal challenges the decree was meant to circumvent, and decisions made under the Decree are themselves being challenged in the courts. This destroys one of Minister Jobim's key arguments for introducing the Decree.

While accepting the recommendation of Brazil's National Indian Foundation, FUNAI, to reject the claims filed against 32 Indian areas, the Minister of Justice decided personally to re-examine the status of eight territories, including the largest currently awaiting demarcation, Raposa/Serra do Sol. His first decision was to reduce the size of Raposa/Serra do Sol, not on technical grounds but to placate the demands of local politicians involved in the exploitation of mineral reserves on Indian lands in Roraima state. Human rights groups fear that this reduction will set a precedent for future cases.

Despite the promise that strenuous efforts would be taken to remove illegal prospectors from the Yanomami territory, no action has been taken over the past year by the Brazilian Government. Although four goldminers were sentenced to 19 years' imprisonment

for the massacre of 17 Yanomami at Haximu in 1993, all are still at liberty, and at least eight Yanomami were killed in 1996 in separate shooting incidents. Failure to remove illegal invaders from Indian areas has led to a series of acts of violence against Indians including the murder of a group of recently identified isolated Indians living in Rondonia, the torture and beatings of Indians, including women and children in Mato Grosso state.

In the absence of public pressure, there is little indication that the Federal Government is prepared to use its resources to curb the impunity with which those who are opposed to Indian rights - often including local authorities - perpetrate acts of violence against them. Judicial inquiries, let alone prosecutions, of those responsible for the killings, torture and other acts of violence against Indians rarely take place.

The agencies recommend that the followings actions be considered:

MPs could point out to the British Government the incompatibility of the Federal Government's Indian policy with the aims of some of ODA's funding for environmental programmes in Brazil. It could also be helpful if the British Government were to make clear to President Cardoso that the reversal of the Minister of Justice's decision on the Raposa/Serra do Sol territory, will be a condition for Britains continued support for these programmes.

In Europe, MEPs could call upon the European Commission, as a matter of urgency, to raise the issue of the reduction of the Raposa/Serra do Sol Indian area with the Brazilian Federal Government. The Commission should examine the implications of this decision for the EU-backed Pilot Programme and consider making continued support for this programme conditional on a reversal of the decision on the reduction of this area.

Brazil's EU partners could express concern to the Brazilian government that the situation of human rights in Brazil, especially impunity, but also the precarious state of health and other basic services, constitutes an obstacle to the further development of ties between the European Union and Mercosul.

Given acceptable guarantees for the complete demarcation of Raposa/Serra do Sol, the European Union could consider funding research and education programmes to explore the possibilities of sustainable development for the state of Roraima through cooperation between the indigenous communities - who are already exploring these possibilities - and the rest of the population.

The World Bank Executive Directors could request information on what precise steps are being taken by the Brazilian Federal government to investigate the very serious incidents that have occurred in areas covered by two World Bank funded projects: PLANAFLORO and PRODEAGRO. One case concerns evidence that a local rancher has carried out the crime of genocide (as defined in the Brazilian Constitution) against a small group of isolated Indians in the Igarape Omere region; the other involves allegations that illegal gold prospectors and loggers on the Sarare Indian reserve were responsible for the unlawful imprisonment, torture and beatings of Nambikwara Indians in Mato Grosso state in November 1996.

The international community could help by encouraging the Brazilian government to fully implement its National Human Rights Programme, to reintroduce measures such as the witness protection scheme, and to back the Programme up with an education campaign, stressing the rights of indigenous communities and other minorities and the need to respect different cultures and life-styles. This could be an opportunity to make a fresh start in relations with the indigenous peoples, review the role of FUNAI and invite the collaboration of indigenous organisations and specialist NGOs in translating their Constitutional rights into new structures and attitudes. This will certainly involve the revision of Decree 1775 and related measures.

Appendix

DENIAL OF INDIANS' RIGHTS: SOME RECENT EXAMPLES

Reduction of the Makuxi Indian Area

In the first of his decisions, announced on 20 December 1996, the Minister ordered the reduction of the Raposa/Serra do Sol Indian area, home to 10,000 Makuxi, Wapixana, Taurepang and Ingariks Indians, in Brazil's northernmost state of Roraima. The anthropological and legal documentation of the Raposa/Serra do Sol demarcation is considered by Brazilian legal and technical experts, including FUNAI, to be outstanding. It is a matter of consensus that the decision to reduce the size of the area has no technical justification, but has been taken on political grounds. The local press in Roraima has published statements by the state's representatives in Congress that they would make the reduction of this area a condition of their support for the President's re-election bid.

The Minister intends to reduce the size of the area (by 200,000 hectares), by excluding from it a number of illegal goldmining settlements and farms. The only argument the Minister can offer to justify this apparent breach of the Brazilian Constitution is the need "to recognise consolidated social fact and the public interest", which is hard to interpret as other than a reward to invaders of indigenous territory. The other surprising measure taken by the Minister is to exclude all roads from the indigenous area, which again appears to be an incentive to outsiders to enter the area.

Given the history of violence against the area's Indians, these measures can hardly have any other effect than to store up a legacy of violence for the future. During 1995, 104 complaints were filed concerning acts of violence against indigenous peoples in the state of Roraima. Between 1988 and 1995, according to the Indigenous Council of Roraima (CIR), 12 Indians were violently killed, mostly in connection with the conflict over the demarcation of Raposa/Serra do Sol, and numerous other cases of rape, torture, beatings and illegal arrests were reported.

Oxfam and other experienced observers believe that this decision will encourage more incursions onto Indian land and will inevitably lead to further contamination and destruction of the environment. Nor does the decision to reduce the Raposa/Serra do Sol Indian Area and permit mining enclaves inside it bode well for the remaining areas awaiting demarcation. It raises serious questions about the use which will be made of international funding, such as the $16 million provided by the German Government for the identification and demarcation of indigenous areas under the Pilot Programme.

British ODA is assisting the government of Roraima to set up a state environmental protection agency. However, given the state government's refusal to consider sustainable development in partnership with the local Indians, this project will require close and continuous monitoring if it is to succeed.

Reports of torture, beatings and the extermination of Indians

The Brazilian Constitution guarantees Indians rights to land they traditionally occupy, and the government has a legal obligation to protect them. The World Bank is supporting work for the protection of 14 groups of isolated Indians in the state of Rondonia (which borders Bolivia), as part of its agro-ecological zoning project, PLANAFLORO. The Bank informed the Executive Directors last year of the 'dramatic discovery' of an isolated group living near the Igarapi Omerj in southern Rondonia. In its 1996 Action Plan, Bank management assured the Executive Directors that, "a FUNAI team is on the site and taking necessary steps to ensure the protection of this group". However, the FUNAI contact team have faced extreme difficulties in carrying out this work, in part because of erratic funding by the state government and FUNAI and in part because of the hostility of local politicians to their work.

In October 1996 documents were presented by FUNAI staff to the Federal Prosecutor proving that a local rancher in Xupinaguaia county, in the state of Rondonia, was attempting to erase all evidence that land he wished to incorporate into his own large estate was in fact occupied by a group of uncontacted Indians. He had allegedly ordered his men to open fire on the surviving members of the isolated group of uncontacted Indians in order to drive them off land that he claims. A contractor had clearcut the forest on the site of the Indians garden, and a bulldozer had been used to extinguish the traces of a wrecked traditional longhouse. The Indians crops of corn and squash were destroyed. This incident is the latest in a series of acts of violence perpetrated against isolated Indians in Corumbiara and Xupinguaia over the past 10 years. A massacre of Indians in the vicinity of the Igarapi Omerj in 1985 has never been subjected to a judicial inquiry.

Frightened and famished, these small isolated indigenous groups have been subjected over the last decade to a process of 'ethnic cleansing' by the cattle ranchers. The pattern of violent expulsions, evidence of killings, and destruction of the Indians' homes and means of subsistence, coupled with complete judicial impunity for the perpetrators, indicates that the genocide of these Indians is commonplace and accepted in the region.

Despite the involvement of the World Bank and the government's contractual obligations to carry out Indian protection, there has been insufficient political will to prevent the extermination of the Indians of Igarapi Omerj. State and project officials constantly deny the presence of uncontacted Indians in the state and have tried on various occasions to have the indigenous sub-component cancelled. No Federal Policy inquiry has yet been opened to investigate this recent case.

Last year the UK World Bank Executive Director expressed concern about attempts by the State Government of Rondonia to use Decree 1775 to challenge some of the areas demarcated with PLANAFLORO funds. Oxfam remains concerned that the World Bank management, in its report on the status of implementation (27 November 1996), while recognising that the indigenous component has encountered many implementation difficulties, downplays the way that local ranchers and politicians are effectively blocking all attempts by the project to provide effective support for health care and assistance to isolated indigenous people. In its latest Status of Implementation Report, presented to the Board in January 1997, no mention is made of the recent allegations of genocide.

Assault on Nambikwara Indians in the Sarari Reserve Mato Grosso

Loggers and miners whose uncontrolled occupation and activities inside the borders of the Sarare Indian reserve have been tolerated for several years by local authorities were responsible for ambushing and violently assaulting at least 14 Katitaulhu Indians, a sub-group of the Nambikwara family, near the town of Pontes e Lacerda in November 1996. The Chief, Americo, suffered serious injuries when a revolver was violently forced into his mouth. The Indians, who included women and children, were subjected to torture and intimidation throughout a day. The assailants then looted the Indians' village, causing damage to a health post and school. Money, tools and vehicles belonging to the Indians were also stolen. The miners allegedly threatened further violence against the Indians and their supporters in human rights organisations.

Not until January 1997 did the Federal government attempt to comply with federal court orders for the removal of the invaders from the area. In so doing, the government not only failed to observe its constitutional duty to protect its Indian citizens but it also violated the 1992 Loan Agreement with the World Bank for the Mato Grosso Natural Resource Management Project, PRODEAGRO. A condition for the release of the $200 million loan was the removal of illegal miners from the Indian reserve and the environmental restoration of areas degraded as a result of mining activities. It has since been reported that FUNAI will apply to the PRODEAGRO Project for funds to repair the damage caused through the Brazilian government's own neglect.

The mining activities in the Sarari Indian area in Mato Grosso state have caused devastation to one third of the reserve. Officials from the state environmental protection agency and IBAMA, the federal government's environmental agency, who have recently returned from the area to oversee the belated operation to remove the invaders (it was started in January 1997) reported that inside the reserve there were 20-40 foot craters and a lot of felled trees. However, few efforts appear to have been taken to identify and apprehend those responsible for the physical assault on the Indians.

copyright Oxfam UK and Ireland 1997

- Urgent action appeal.

Subject: Urgent Action: Parakana involved in mahogany scheme (Brazil)

Sender: saiic@igc.org

The Parakana Indians of the Apyterewa Indigenous area in the south region of Para state, Brazil, are being exploited in a scheme to smuggle mahogany from the federally restricted area. The woodcutters, while decimating the Indigenous land, entice the Parakana Indians (usually youths) into locating prime mahogany sites by offering them food and alcohol, and arming them to drive away Funai officials.

An estimated 15% of the 980,000 hectare Indigenous area has been invaded by woodcutters, miners, farmers, and settlers. 5,000 hectares have been devastated by the Perachi timber company for pasture.

Though Funai and the Ministry of Justice are aware of the Parakana Indians' plight, they have been unable to enforce the federal decree. Help in the form of letters from entities and persons who support the Indigenous cause is asked. Following is a sample letter, and address and fax information.

Sample letter:

I am concerned with the exploitation of the Parakana Indians for the illegal exportation of mahogany from the Apyterewa Indigenous area by the Perachi timber company and the encroachment of this federally restricted land by miners, farmers, and settlers. I urge you to, as soon as possible, enforce the federal restrictions on the export of mahogany and to ensure that the territory demarcated as Indigenous land is preserved.

Send faxes to:

1. Minister of Justice, Nelson Jobim

fax: 061 224 2448

E-mail: gregori@mj.gov.br (Jose Gregori - Cabinet Chief)

2. President of FUNAI- National Foundation of the Indigenous,

Julio Gaiger fax: 061 226 8782

3. President of the Republic, Fernando Henrique Cardoso fax:

061 226 7566

E-mail: pr@planalto.gov.br

Information from the Indianist Missionary Council, CIMI

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South and Meso American Indian Rights Center (SAIIC)

P.O. Box 28703

Oakland CA, 94604

Phone: (510)834-4263 Fax: (510)834-4264

Email: saiic@igc.apc.org

Office: 1714 Franklin Street, 3rd Floor, Oakland

Home Page: http://www.maxwell.syr.edu/nativeweb/abyayala/orgs/saiic

For more information about SAIIC, send an empty email message to:

saiic-info@igc.apc.org

- Weekly newsletter of the indigenous Missionary Council (CIMI).

Newsletter n. 246

WORLD BANK PRESSURES STATE OF RONDONIA

Representatives of the World Bank (IRDB) in Brazil asked the government of the state of Rondonia to check accusations of invasion and depredation of the indigenous area of Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau and of the Guajara-Mirim state park. The World Bank is funding the Agriculture/Livestock and Forest Recovery Plan of Rondonia (Planafloro), whose objective, among others, is ``to strengthen the system of inspection and control of protected areas in the state of Rondonia''. In November of last year the bank had warned governor Valdir Raupp that the deadline for the conclusion of the project would only be extended if those areas were inspected and controlled and, because of the new accusations, it requested the government of that state to provide a detailed description of plans to protect indigenous territories. Indianist entities fear that the Planafloro, which was implemented in mid-1992, may produce the same disastrous results brought about by another program funded by the World Bank - the Polonoroeste - which caused serious environmental damages in the region.

The accusations involving the two indigenous areas came from CIMI, the Eco-Environmental Defense Association - Kaninde, and the Board of Indigenous Nations and Peoples of Rondonia, North of Mato Grosso do Sul and South of Amazonas (CUNPIR). CIMI revealed that the only inspection carried out last year showed that approximately 400 families are living in the Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau area, of which only 20 reside there permanently, while the rest is there to take possession of plots and/or fell trees. The machines that were seized during this inspection were returned to the invaders for unknown reasons. The Kaninde entity is requesting and audit of the environmental component of the Planafloro program, which will probably reveal that millions of cubic meters of hardwood were stolen from the indigenous areas in question. Still according to Kaninde, 80% of the resources available for inspection purposes were cut and a new interinstitutional group was set up to follow up this activity, which did not include various Indian-supporting NGOs.

According to a letter written by CUNPIR, the Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau Indians area being bullied and mistreated by woodcutters, ``grileiros''(persons who produce false title deeds to take possession of land illegally) and squatters who area being encouraged by unscrupulous politicians to invade the area and build roads in them to facilitate the transportation of the stolen hardwood. The action of the invaders affects the life of the indigenous population, whose game is fleeing the destroyed forest. The damages caused to the indigenous population affect humankind at large as well, because a specific biodiversity is being destroyed.

JOBIM's EXIT STIRS THE EXPECTATIONS OF INVADERS OF INDIGENOUS AREAS

The exit of Nelson Jobim from the Ministry of Justice is stirring the expectations of invaders of indigenous areas. According to the national press, Jobim will take office as justice of the Supreme Federal Court some time between now and March. The Ministry of Justice has not confirmed this information, but some regional newspapers have been publishing news about politicians who claim that some pending demarcations of indigenous areas will be settled before Jobim leaves the ministry. The first case refers to the Bau indigenous area, the land of the Kaiapo Indians in the state of Para. The newspaper O Liberal says that, based on the adversary system provided for in Decree 1,775/96, the minister will analyze an appeal filed by a mayor to settle an issue involving that indigenous reservation. Another case refers to the Panambizinho indigenous area in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, a region where the suicide rate among the Guarani-Kaiowa is high. In this case, according to the O Progresso newspaper, local politicians are assuring settlers that the minister will annul a decree which expanded the indigenous area in December of 1995. According to that decision, the area was expanded from 60 to 1,180 hectares. The settlers were in the indigenous area 37 years ago under a Land Reform project developed by late president Getulio Vargas.

Brasilia, 6 February 1997

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