A Munduruku indigenous man was killed in a gunfight with Brazilian federal police at a remote Amazonian settlement, in a conflict over outlaw gold-mining in the area.
Work on Brazil’s controversial $13 billion Belo Monte hydro-dam has been at a halt since workers torched buildings at three work sites in a wage dispute.
A Guarani-Kaiowa tribe in Mato Grosso do Sul say their eviction from ancestral lands following a court order obtained by a rancher will mean their “collective death.”
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR, or CIDH in Spanish), a body of the Organization of American States (OAS), issued a statement Sept. 5 urging Venezuelan authorities “to conduct a thorough investigation” into assertions made by representatives of the… Read moreOAS rights body presses for truth in Yanomami massacre claims
Venezuelan officials investigating the reported massacre of an isolated Yanomami community say they found no evidence of the attack—a claim dismissed by indigenous advocates.
A Brazilian federal judge in Pará agreed to conduct the first trial against members of the former dictatorship for war crimes during the military’s rule from 1964-1985.
Rights groups warn that the Afro-descendant Quilombo Pontes community in Brazil’s lawless Maranhão state is being “systematically threatened” by gunmen in the pay of local ranchers.
Authorities in Venezuela pledge to investigate breaking reports that illegal gold miners in southern Amazonas state carried out a “massacre” of an isolated Yanomami indigenous community. Witnesses of the aftermath described finding “burnt bodies and bones” at the community of Irotatheri,… Read moreVenezuela: Yanomami massacred by outlaw miners
A Brazilian federal judge on Aug. 23 ruled that permits for more than 120 proposed hydro-electric dams in the Upper Paraguay River Basin cannot be issued without first conducting environmental impact assessments, dealing a blow to a major thrust of… Read moreBrazil: court blocks mega-hydro to protect Pantanal
Brazil has mobilized nearly 9,000 military troops to its borders with four neighboring countries as part of an operation aimed at interrupting narco-trafficking networks.
