Relatives within the Jungle: This Struggle to Defend an Secluded Rainforest Tribe

Tomas Anez Dos Santos toiled in a small open space within in the of Peru Amazon when he detected footsteps approaching through the thick forest.

It dawned on him that he stood encircled, and froze.

“One person stood, aiming using an arrow,” he recalls. “Unexpectedly he detected I was here and I began to flee.”

He found himself face to face the Mashco Piro tribe. Over many years, Tomas—who lives in the modest community of Nueva Oceania—was virtually a neighbor to these wandering tribe, who shun contact with strangers.

An updated document by a human rights group claims remain a minimum of 196 described as “uncontacted groups” remaining worldwide. The Mashco Piro is thought to be the largest. The study claims 50% of these groups may be wiped out in the next decade if governments neglect to implement additional actions to defend them.

It claims the greatest risks stem from timber harvesting, extraction or operations for crude. Remote communities are extremely vulnerable to common sickness—consequently, it notes a risk is posed by interaction with proselytizers and online personalities in pursuit of clicks.

In recent times, members of the tribe have been appearing to Nueva Oceania increasingly, as reported by residents.

The village is a fishing village of a handful of clans, perched elevated on the shores of the local river in the center of the Peruvian rainforest, a ten-hour journey from the nearest settlement by watercraft.

The area is not classified as a safeguarded reserve for uncontacted groups, and timber firms operate here.

Tomas says that, on occasion, the sound of industrial tools can be detected continuously, and the community are observing their jungle damaged and destroyed.

Among the locals, residents state they are conflicted. They are afraid of the projectiles but they also have profound respect for their “kin” residing in the forest and wish to safeguard them.

“Allow them to live as they live, we can't alter their culture. That's why we preserve our separation,” explains Tomas.

The people in Nueva Oceania are worried about the harm to the tribe's survival, the danger of conflict and the chance that deforestation crews might introduce the Mashco Piro to illnesses they have no defense to.

At the time in the community, the group made themselves known again. Letitia, a young mother with a two-year-old child, was in the forest picking food when she heard them.

“There were cries, sounds from people, many of them. Like there was a large gathering yelling,” she told us.

That was the first instance she had come across the group and she fled. After sixty minutes, her head was persistently racing from fear.

“Because exist deforestation crews and companies clearing the forest they're running away, perhaps because of dread and they come in proximity to us,” she explained. “We don't know how they will behave with us. That is the thing that frightens me.”

Recently, two individuals were confronted by the tribe while fishing. A single person was wounded by an bow to the abdomen. He lived, but the other person was located dead days later with nine arrow wounds in his body.

The Peruvian government follows a approach of no engagement with isolated people, establishing it as prohibited to commence encounters with them.

The strategy was first adopted in a nearby nation after decades of advocacy by tribal advocacy organizations, who saw that initial interaction with remote tribes could lead to entire communities being decimated by sickness, poverty and starvation.

Back in the eighties, when the Nahau tribe in Peru came into contact with the world outside, 50% of their community died within a short period. During the 1990s, the Muruhanua people suffered the identical outcome.

“Remote tribes are extremely susceptible—from a disease perspective, any exposure may transmit sicknesses, and including the simplest ones could eliminate them,” says an advocate from a Peruvian indigenous rights group. “Culturally too, any interaction or intrusion may be very harmful to their existence and survival as a society.”

For local residents of {