Awá demand immediate eviction of loggers

A recent press release says Earth’s most endangered tribe needs urgent help

The Awá, a tribe located in Brazil , have written to the country’s Justice Minister asking him to ‘evict invaders urgently’, as news emerges that their hunting livelihood is being held to ransom by the activities of illegal loggers. Frightened for their lives and intimidated, even killed, by itinerant loggers, they are unable to go hunting in their own forest anymore.

The Awá ‘s written appeal coincides with fresh video testimony from an Awá man, called Piar’ima’a (“Little Fish”). Little Fish denounces the awful effects illegal logging is having on his tribe’s ability to hunt and says: “Children are crying and they are hungry. Where shall I go to hunt? The loggers are here. We can’t go out alone, the loggers could kill us …… there are trucks, chainsaws and cars everywhere. So I don’t go out hunting any more. We stay at home. We are sad we can’t go out into the forest.”

One of the world’s few nomadic hunter-gatherer peoples, relying on the forest for their food and survival, if not resolved now, this situation provides genuine concern for the survival of the Awá.

“I don’t go to their city and steal things’ says Little Fish, “so why are the loggers destroying our land?”

Large-scale mining is also affecting the tribe’s ability to hunt and a proposed e expansion to this industry would entail a railway line close to the Awá’s land, which it is feared will frighten off the game animals the Awá depend on for food from hunting.

Translation of the Awá’s letter: ‘We Awá-Guajá would like to know when you will evict the invaders from our forest. We know you have decided to make the Awá-Guajá a priority now.
We hope you will send people to evict these invaders, urgently! Only then will we be satisfied!’

Source:  Survival International