Brazilian authorities are investigating the alleged massacre of 8 to 10 members of an “uncontacted” tribe in the country’s Javari Valley.
Allegations of the massacre first arose after illegal gold miners reportedly boasted of the murders, for which they claimed responsibility, in a bar near the Colombia border. The incident was subsequently taken up by the prosecutor for the town of Tabatinga, Pablo Bertrand, in early August. Brazil’s agency on indigenous affairs, known as Funai, has also become involved.
“There is a lot of evidence, but,” as Funai’s coordinator for uncontacted and recently contacted tribes, Leila Silvia Burger Sotto-Maior, cautioned, “it needs to be proven.”
Still, the alleged violence is egregious and, if confirmed, will become only the latest in a series of clashes between indigenous populations and non-indigenous Brazilians in a region said to contain nearly a fifth of the country’s uncontacted tribes.
“It was crude bar talk,” said Sotto-Maior, as quoted in the New York Times, but the men carried items they claimed they had taken from their victims, namely a hand-carved paddle and a small bag used for carrying food. “They even bragged about cutting up the bodies and throwing them in the river.”