The Brazilian government has adopted policies that seriously threaten the rights of Indigenous peoples, Human Rights Watch said today, the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.
The administration of President Jair Bolsonaro has undermined the government agency tasked with protecting those rights, issued regulations that are harmful to Indigenous people, and halted the recognition of their traditional lands. The government has also weakened the federal environmental protection agencies, the Brazilian Institute of the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA, its Portuguese acronym) and the Institute for the Conservation of Biodiversity (ICMBio), leaving Indigenous territories even more vulnerable to encroachment.
During his electoral campaign in 2018, Bolsonaro lambasted Brazil’s Indigenous affairs agency (FUNAI) for protecting Indigenous rights and pledged to “scythe” it. Once in office, he has delivered on that pledge, Human Rights Watch said.
In 2019, a FUNAI agent, Maxciel Pereira dos Santos, was killed in Tabatinga, execution-style. His murder remains unsolved. Bruno Pereira, who was on leave from FUNAI, was killed in 2022, along with journalist Dom Phillips. Pereira had been the director of FUNAI’s office for uncontacted people but was removed after he led a successful operation against illegal mining in the Javari Valley in 2019. Federal prosecutors have charged three men allegedly involved in illegal fishing with Bruno Pereira and Phillips’ murders.