Situation of Indigenous Peoples in Mato Grosso do Sul slide image

Situation of Indigenous Peoples in Mato Grosso do Sul

INDIGENIST MISSIONARY COUNCIL - CIMI teme AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL: THE APIKA'Y COMMUNITY'S LONG AND PAINFUL STRUGGLE CONTINUES 18 "The struggle will go on, even if I die, because I have many grandsons", Damiana, leader of the Apika'y community" The Apika'y community, in the region of Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil, is a powerful symbol of several problems that affect the Guarani- Kaiowá and other Indigenous peoples in Brazil. Disappointed with the sluggish land demarcation process, the Guarani Kaiowá began to reoccupy their ancestral lands in the 1990s. In September 2013, around 60 Guarani Kaiowá people from the Apika'y community and other villages occupied the land currently farmed for sugar, which they claim belong to them. They have been living beside a highway, in front of the farm, since 1999 when the landowner issued them with an eviction order. "We left the highway. Now we are already here, in this land, and we will remain here forever", Damiana, leader of the Apika'y community. The community has reported that armed private security guards working on the sugar plantation have threatened to kill them, burned parts of the settlement, and also prevented them from collecting water in a stream that runs through the sugarcane plantation. Employees of the security company have been charged AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL with offences before, including two ongoing murder cases. The federal prosecutor has claimed that the company conducts "incontestable illicit activity" and is calling for the "suspension of its activities". The National Indigenous Foundation (FUNAI) signed a Conduct Adjustment Agreement with the Ministry of Justice, the Federal Public Prosecutors and 23 indigenous leaders in 2007 in which it promised to demarcate the lands of the Apika'y community by 2010. But the agreement was never implemented, due to the lack of resources by FUNAI. Brazil's sustained economic growth over the past decade has transformed the country into a major world economy. However, more than 39.9 per cent of Indigenous people live in extreme poverty - more than double the percentage in the general population. Mato Grosso do Sul contains some of the smallest, poorest and most densely populated Indigenous lands in Brazil: pockets of rural poverty surrounded by large soybean and sugarcane plantations and cattle ranches, where life is plagued by ill-health and squalid living conditions. What were hectares of forest with incredible diversity are now fields of sugar cane and soy beans. For over a century their communities have been driven from their lands by the expansion of large scale agriculture - a process that continues to this day. The consequences for affected communities can be devastating. 40 18 Report: Indigenous peoples' long struggle to defend their Rights in the Americas. Published by Amnesty International, visit in full at: http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/ asset/AMR01/002/2014/en/d30d7c8c-12bd-47cd-8229-b13a29363ccf/amr010022014en.pdf
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