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Group of youngsters
spotted along river in Brazil after cocaine-farming gangsters burn down homes
and massacre families, forcing tribespeople into the open
Rare footage has emerged of an Amazonian tribe making contact with the outside world for the first time after being driven from their homes by drug traffickers and illegal logging. It is thought their homes were burnt down by cocaine gangsters.
Disturbing reports say the indigenous people on the Envira river, on Brazil-Peru border, have faced extreme violence at the hands of the drug gangs with many of their older relatives massacred.
The group of young men and women, wearing loincloths and carrying bows and arrows, are believed to be part of a group of at least 50 natives who have had no contact with the outside world.
Interpreter Zé Correia said: “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.
"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.”
The video was first published on Survival International's site, which is working to protect tribal people's rights.
The rare footage shows the group accepting an offering of bananas from locals living along the river bank after fleeing across the border into Brazil.
Brazil's Indian Affairs Foundation has intervened to protect the tribe after they wandered for seven days along the river.
They told a translator they had been shot at and many of their relatives had died. They are believed to have gone in search of weapons and tools but many of them contacted flu as they are not immune to common viruses.
They were treated locally and have now returned to their villages.
Campaigners say there are hundreds of natives in the region who are under threat and added that the situation is 'deeply serious'.
Oil and gas mining and illegal destruction of the rainforest is also causing natives to flee their homes.
José Carlos Meirelles, who has monitored the tribes in the region for FUNAI for decades, said, “If they don’t make things secure for whoever turns up there, unfortunately we’ll repeat history and we will be jointly responsible for the extermination of these people."
In March a tribe were pictured staring cautiously at a passing airplane as they peered out from behind a shelter near the Xinane river in Brazil's Acre state.
The pictures were captured by anthropologists monitoring their movements as they edged closer to communities.
In 2012 the previously contacted Mascho-Piro Indian tribe were pictured in the Manu National Park in Peru.
At the time, scientists said they had begun appearing on the banks of jungle rivers because of encroachment by loggers.
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