ReportReport onon ViolenceViolence AgainstAgainst IndigenousIndigenous PeoplesPeoples inin BrazilBrazil 20192019 DATADATA Report on Violence Against Indigenous Peoples in Brazil 2019 DATA SUPPORT is report is published by the Indigenist Missionary Council (Conselho Indigenista Missionário - CIMI), an entity linked to the National Conference of Brazilian Bishops (Conferência Nacional dos Bispos do Brasil - CNBB) www.cimi.org.br PRESIDENT Don Roque Paloschi VICE PRESIDENT Lúcia Gianesini EXECUTIVE SECRETARY Antônio Eduardo C. Oliveira ASSISTANT SECRETARY Cleber César Buzatto Report on Violence Against Indigenous Peoples in Brazil – 2019 Data 1984-7645 ISS N RESEARCH COORDINATION Lucia Helena Rangel RESEARCH AND DATA SURVEY CIMI Regional Offices and CIMI Documentation Sector ORGANIZATION OF DATA TABLES Eduardo Holanda and Leda Bosi REVIEW OF DATA TABLES Lucia Helena Rangel and Roberto Antonio Liebgott IMAGE SELECTION Aida Cruz EDITORIAL COORDINATION Patrícia Bonilha LAYO U T Licurgo S. Botelho COVER In August 2019, farmers occupying part of the Valparaiso Indigenous Land, which was claimed by the Apurinã people 29 years ago, burned 600 of the approximately 27,000 hectares of the area located in the municipality of Boca do Acre, in southern part of the state of Amazonas. Among other serious losses, the fire destroyed a chestnut plantation used by the indigenous community as a source of livelihood Photo: Denisa Sterbova is issue of the Report on Violence Against Indigenous Peoples in Brazil –2019 Data is dedicated to all the victims of indigenous rights violations, as well as to those engaged in the fight for life, in particular the Prophet, Confessor and Poet Pedro Casaldáliga (1928-2020). Since CIMI was established, Pedro has taught us to: Be the water that flows through the stones and Jump off the inherited iron rails, Trade a career for the Path in the ministry of the Kingdom, Go out into the world to establish peace built on the foundations of justice and solidarity. Pedro, we thank you because in times of small preys and big predators, your life among us was and will be e memory of commitment to the causes of the Kingdom, e banner of the fight for indigenous peoples and the poor, e warning against rest in the comfort zone, and e Bell of Hope for another possible world. P h ot o: D en isa S t erb ova The sharp increase in invasions, land grabbing, criminal fires, land “subdivision, threats, conflicts, neglect of health care and education, and criminalization among other violations of their rights, shows that indigenous peoples are facing one of the most challenging times in Brazilian history since the country’s invasion by the colonizers” TABLE OF CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY CHAPTER I Violence Against Property 6 51 Inaction and Delay in Land Regularization 72 Conflicts Over Territorial Rights PREFACE 78 Possessory Invasions, Illegal Exploitation of Natural 9 Indigenous Peoples of Brazil and the Resources and Various Damage to Property Permanent Agony of Seeing Their Lives and Lands Taken Away: Until When? CHAPTER II Don Roque Paloschi Violence Against the Person 109 Abuse of Power INTRODUCTION 112 Death Threat 118 Various Threats 2019: Hope in the Perseverance and Resistance 11 124 Murder of Indigenous Peoples as a Counterpoint to 133 Involuntary Manslaughter a Return to the Dark Ages 136 Antônio Eduardo Cerqueira de Oliveira Intentional Bodily Injuries Cléber César Buzatto 139 Racism and Ethnic-Cultural Discrimination 142 Attempted Murder Bolsonaro Set Up a Government 14 of Predators and Destroyers of Lives 146 Sexual Violence Lucia Helena Rangel Roberto Antonio Liebgott CHAPTER III Violence Resulting from the Inaction of Public Authorities ARTICLES 150 General Lack of Support 161 Lack of Support for Indigenous School Education 19 You Will See No Country: 170 Lack of Health Care In a Year Marked by Fires, Indigenous 182 Spread of Alcohol and Other Drugs Lands were Devastated by Fires 186 Childhood Mortality Renato Santana Tiago Miotto 187 Death from Lack of Health Care 191 Suicide 26 Xukuru People vs Brazil: A Paradigm of the Inter-American Court in the CHAPTER IV Affirmation of Indigenous Territorial Rights Violence Against Free and Semi-Isolated Indigenous Peoples Adelar Cupsinski 195 The Government’s Anti-Indigenous Politics Chantelle da Silva Teixeira Threatens Free Indigenous Peoples The Role of Imprisonment in Institutional 197 List of Free or Isolated Indigenous Peoples 27 Violence Against Indigenous Peoples in Brazil Michael Mary Nolan CHAPTER V Caroline Dias Hilgert Memory and Justice Viviane Balbuglio 202 Integration of Indigenous People, Guardianship Bolsonaro’s Indigenous Budget and Policy in 2019 and Demographic Void: Concepts of Denial of Rights 35 Ricardo Verdum ANNEX 43 Self-Inflicted Violence: Young Indigenous 210 Summary of Violence Against People and the Enigmas of Suicide Indigenous Peoples in Brazil Lucia Helena Rangel Report on – Violence Against Indigenous Peoples in Brazil – 2019 Data 5 Indigenist Missionary Council | Conselho Indigenista Missionário - Cimi EXECUTIVE SUMMARY he report Violence Against Indigenous Peoples in Brazil damage.” is can be seen in “territorial conflicts,” which - 2019 data, published annually by the Missionary went from 11 to 35 cases in 2019; “death threat,” which TCouncil for Indigenous Peoples (CIMI for its Portu- went from 8 to 33; “various threats”, which went from guese acronym), reiterates the picture of an extremely 14 to 34 cases; “intentional bodily injuries”, which perverse and worrying reality of the indigenous peoples in almost tripled, going from 5 to 13; and “deaths due Brazil in the first year of Jair Bolsonaro as president of the to lack of assistance,” which went from 11 to 31 cases country. e intensification of expropriations of indig- in 2019. enous lands, forged in the invasion, land grabbing, and subdivision of the lands, is quickly and aggressively Property-Related Violence being consolidated throughout the national territory, causing immeasurable destruction. Concerning the three types of “Property-Related In addition to materializing the recognition of an Violence,” which comprise the first chapter of the report, original right, indigenous lands are evidently the areas that the following data were recorded: omission and delay in most protect forests and their rich ecosystems. Historically, land regularization (829 cases); conflicts over terri- the presence of indigenous peoples within their territories torial rights (35 cases); and possessory invasions, has made them function as real barriers to the advance of illegal exploitation of natural resources, and various deforestation and other plunder processes. However, 2019 damage to property (256 registered cases); totaling data reveals that the indigenous peoples and their 1,120 cases of violence against the heritage of indigenous traditional territories are being explicitly usurped. peoples in 2019. e “explosion” of criminal fires that devastated the It should be noted that of 1,298 indigenous lands Amazon and the Cerrado in 2019, with vast international in Brazil, 829 (63%) are pending something from repercussions, should be put into this broader perspective the government to finalize its demarcation process of the destruction of indigenous territories. Oftentimes, and registration as a traditional indigenous territory with fires are an essential part of a criminal land-grabbing Brazil’s Department of National Heritage (Secretaria do scheme. e “clearing” of extensive areas of forest Patrimônio da União, SPU). Of these 829, a total of 536 is done to enable the implementation of crops, for lands (64%) have had zero action from the govern- example. In a nutshell, this chain works like this: invaders ment. deforest, sell the wood, set fire to the forest, start the In addition to fulfilling his promise not to demarcate pasture, fence the area, and, finally, after the “clearing,” place an inch of indigenous land, President Bolsonaro and cattle in the area and, later, plant soy or corn. his administration, through its Ministry of Justice, Unfortunately, the violence against indigenous peoples returned 27 demarcation processes to the National is based on a government project that aims to make their Indian Foundation (FUNAI) in the first half of 2019, to land and the common assets contained therein available to be reviewed. is action certainly implies more significant agribusiness, mining, and logging entrepreneurs, among obstacles, if not the impediment, to the fulfillment of the others. constitutional rights of the indigenous people who claim e report points out that, in 2019, there was an their ancestral territories. increase in cases in 16 of the 19 categories of violence As mentioned, in 2019, 256 cases of “posses- systematized by the publication. Particular attention sory invasions, illegal exploitation of resources, is drawn to the intensification of records in the category and damage to property” were recorded in at least “possessory invasions, illegal exploitation of resources, and 151 indigenous lands, of 143 indigenous peoples, damage to property,” which, from 109 cases registered in in 23 states. Confirming the forecast made by CIMI last 2018, jumped to 256 cases in 2019. September, on the occasion of the launch of its previous In tune with reality, these data explain an unprece- report, these data reveal an extremely worrying reality: dented tragedy in the country: indigenous lands are being last year alone, there was an increase of 134.9% of ostensibly invaded and destroyed across the country. cases related to