Copyright © 2000 NLThomas
All Rights Reserved

Brazil - On 22nd April 2000, Brazil will celebrate the 500th anniversary of the arrival of the first white man, the Portuguese explorer Pedro Alvares Cabral, to its shores. Brazil's Indians, feeling that there is little to celebrate, will be marking the anniversary with a protest march through Santa Cruz da Cabrália by some 2,000 Indians and will be commemorating '500 Years of Indigenous, Black and Popular Resistance'. The Pataxó Indians have threatened to invade the site of Cabral's arrival in protest.

The government has planned nationwide festivities to celebrate this date, even though:

* When Cabral arrived the estimated Indian population was 5,000,000 people, belonging to 1,000 tribes. Today, following centuries of disease, slavery, violence, starvation and suicide, there are only 330,000 Indians divided into about 210 tribes.
*There are approximately 50 uncontacted tribes in Brazil. They are vulnerable to attack as loggers, miners and ranchers compete for their land. *Along with Suriname, Brazil is the only Latin American country not to recognise the right, enshrined in international law, of tribal peoples to own their land.
*Brazil is in violation of its own constitution by failing to demarcate all indigenous territories by 1993.Only 284 of the 561 Indian territories have been demarcated. The average life expectancy of non-Indian Brazilians is 67 years.
*The average life expectancy of Brazilian Indians is only 42.6 years, and there are regions where Indians live to only 24.5 years. In 1999 Yanomami mortality was twice that of the rest of Brazil.
* The Yanomami are 12 times more likely to contract tuberculosis than non-Indians. Infant mortality is alarming: 141deaths per 1,000 people, twice the rate of even the poorest white people.
*The Guarani are currently experiencing a suicide epidemic as ranchers terrorise them with gunmen and deny them access to their land.

Survival's campaigner for Brazil will be attending the march on 22nd April and will be available for interview by telephone.

SI has recent betacam footage of the Yanomami, Guarani, Matis and Marubo. SI's photo library contains pictures of many of Brazil's tribal peoples, and we have interviews with tribal people available for publication.

Survival's Brazil Report will be published later this year.

For further information please contact,
Iona Singleton: Phone: on +44 (0)20 72421441,
FAX: on +44 (0)20 7242 1771 ~ E-mail: is@survival-international.org
More details about this and all Survival's work are available on the web. URL: http://www.survival-international.org

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