© FunaiWhen young people from an indigenous tribe in Peru made contact with a settlement in Brazil, they reported violent attacks on elders in their community.
After years of living in isolation from the outside world, several young members of this "uncontacted" tribe recently entered a nearby settled community in Brazil. Through interpreters, they told harrowing stories about their encounters in the forests.
"The majority of old people were massacred by non-Indians in Peru, who shot at them with firearms and set fire to the houses of the uncontacted," an interpreter named Zé Correia reported through Survival International, a group that advocates for tribal people's rights. "They say that many old people died, and that they buried three people in one grave. They say that so many people died that they couldn't bury them all and their corpses were eaten by vultures."
In late June, a few members of the tribe emerged from the forest and voluntarily made contact with Ashaninka people in the village of Simpatia, in Brazil's Acre state. FUNAI, Brazil's indigenous affairs department, released a video clip of this initial contact today (July 31) that shows young tribe members exchanging bananas and other goods.
FUNAI representatives learned that these people had walked several days to Simpatia from their home turf within Peru's borders. Most of the tribe members appeared healthy at first. But after several visits to Simpatia, some showed flu-like symptoms. Earlier this month, seven of them were treated for acute respiratory infections.
Brazilian officials have gleaned that this tribe has had sporadic encounters with non-Indians, which have resulted in "terrible losses," said Fiona Watson, a researcher and field director with Survival International. These indigenous people also had a gun, some screws and other items that they may have purloined from non-Indians, perhaps from a logging camp, Watson told Live Science.
Her organization "is extremely concerned about their health, about possible future attacks, and about the reports from the uncontacted that some of their community were killed at the hands of non-Indians and their homes set on fire," Watson said in an emailed statement. She added that the organization is also worried about the ability of the Brazilian and Peruvian governments to contain a future epidemic in the region. Uncontacted people are particularly vulnerable to diseases, such as malaria and the flu, against which they have no immunity.
"There is an urgent priority to get trained specialist health teams able to go in immediately when any uncontacted appear, and for far greater monitoring of and protection of the territories of uncontacted tribes from invasions," Watson said.
Survival International has called on Peru to investigate the reports of a "massacre" and Brazil to allocate more funds for its uncontacted Indians unit to monitor the region.
The news comes two days after the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) released an extensive report urging South American governments to protect the rights of indigenous people who live in voluntary isolation, and are at risk of confrontations with loggers, miners, oil and gas companies, religious missionaries, misguided ecotourism ventures, and drug traffickers.
Reminds me of the same situation when Europeans had first contact with the tribes of North America. Remember the smallpox infested blankets.
They are a peoples that have probably survived for countless generations, living in communion with the earth and its' natural surroundings. They appear extremely healthy which can be more than said our so called civilized societies. They don't have any claim to the land because to claim ownership it is probably completely alien to them.
So what happens, some psychopathic corporations decide they want the land and it's resources for there own profit, invades there living space, where they have lived slept, eaten and raised there families for generations and they kill them. Sounds like modern day civilization has caught up with them.
Our ancient cultures instead of being decimated should be revered and learned from. How did they manage to maintain there health live and survive, live in a communal setting without seeing bloodshed of there tribe on a daily basis, which is so prevalent in our so called civilized world. And also maintain there health and wellbeing without all the so called modern pharmaceuticals that are doled out on a daily basis. They look pretty healthy with well developed bodies to me.
Strikes me have learned nothing from the so called Modern Era, they are still looked upon as savages by the vast majority of society. Makes me wonder who is the savage.
Maybe a re-reading of Brave New World wouldn't go amiss.