BRAZIL: Urgent need for President to protect Indian territory
Twelve thousand Indians are at serious and immediate risk because of the President’s delay in ratifying the boundaries of Raposa-Serra do Sol, their homeland in northern Brazil. The physical mapping out and demarcation of the area has been completed by the authorities, but until President Lula formally approves the process, the area is vulnerable; local politicians are campaigning for its reduction. Miners, cattle ranchers, and rice farmers have invaded the Indians’ territory illegally, bringing with them disease, alcohol, prostitution and pollution. Additionally, the army has built a barracks beside an Indian community causing great unease. Survival is calling on President Lula to ratify the boundaries immediately and prevent further destruction of the Indians’ land and way of life.



PARAGUAY: illegal incursions into uncontacted Indians’ territory
Illegal incursions into the territory of uncontacted Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indians in Paraguay are continuing. Landowners are erecting fences along tracks bulldozed illegally into the forest: this is the first step to clearing the forest and introducing cattle. The Ayoreo-Totobiegosode are the last uncontacted Indians south of the Amazon basin, and in recent years have been confined to an ever-smaller area. Mennonite farmers and Brazilian land-owners are buying up the forest in which the Totobiegosode live, and rapidly clearing it. Legal injunctions are supposed to protect a core area of 550,000 hectares of Totobiegosode territory, but clearance activity continues. Paraguayan law says the Indians have the right to own their land, but so far they have gained title only to a small fraction of it.

PAPUA: Man killed by police amid rising tension
Iyut Heselo, a Papuan tribesman, was killed on July 7th when Indonesian police opened fire at a non-violent pro-independence ceremony in Wamena, in the central highlands of Papua (formerly Irian Jaya). Four demonstrators were arrested; two of them had also been shot. The arrested men are still in custody with no access to a lawyer, and at serious risk of torture. Since this incident, the Indonesian army has been a more noticeable presence in Wamena, and the local population has reported a general feeling of tension and intimidation. Survival fears that the heightened presence of the Indonesian army in Papua is likely to precipitate further clashes.

APPEAL: Two new T-shirts and a £1,000,000 fundraising challenge
Survival has launched an ambitious £1,000,000 fund-raising campaign with the release of two exclusive new T-shirts. Reaching this ambitious target will allow us greatly to expand our work for the world’s most vulnerable tribal peoples. Our aim is simple: that tribal peoples are allowed to live on their own land in peace, now and always. Celebrate your individuality and help tribal peoples with our ‘Different people, ideas, beliefs make life more interesting’ and ‘Survival for tribal peoples’ T-shirts.