Ibama agents destroy a plane and camp used by illegal gold miners in the Yanomami territory. © Ibama

Dear Jack,

New hope for Brazil’s Yanomami

At last! We’ve just heard that the Brazilian government is launching a major operation to remove thousands of illegal goldminers who have been terrorizing the Yanomami for years, bringing violence, starvation, and destruction.

Together with the Yanomami, Survival has long been demanding action. Thousands of you emailed the Brazilian government urging it to act. Now – finally – it has: in one of his first major decisions, newly-elected President Lula is sending in federal agents and units of the National Public Security Force to remove the invading miners.

Illegal miners are arrested in the Yanomami territory by Ibama agents and others. © Força nacional

It’s hard to overstate the damage caused by the mining invasion in recent years:

• The deaths of hundreds of Yanomami, especially children, from preventable infectious diseases and malnutrition.

• Destruction of Yanomami forest by illegal airstrips, a road and thousands of mines that now scar the landscape.

• Poisoning of the rivers with mercury.

• Appalling violence, with miners and violent criminal gangs terrorizing communities, murdering Yanomami and raping women and girls.

One of the uncontacted Yanomami communal houses, seen from the air. © Guilherme Gnipper Trevisan/FUNAI/Hutukara

Miners even reached areas of forest inhabited by uncontacted Yanomami people. This has all precipitated a catastrophic health crisis so severe President Lula has called it “a genocide.” It will take time and serious political will to repair the damage and dismantle and bring to justice the invading gangs – but there is now hope once more throughout the Yanomami’s homeland.

Survival has worked with the Yanomami for more than 50 years, both in their original campaign for official recognition of their land, and over the many decades that they’ve been resisting these invasions. While the last few years have been deeply traumatic for the Yanomami, your willingness to take action to support them has shone through, and ensured a global spotlight on this genocide.

We are of course, monitoring the situation closely, especially over the border in Venezuela: many miners already operate in Yanomami territory there, and more may now come.

We’ll keep you updated via emails and our social media, and if you’re not following us yet, please use the buttons below to do so – breaking news is always posted there first.

But for now, at last, the Yanomami have some hope that they, and their forest, can start to recover.

Best wishes,

Caroline Pearce
Executive Director