Amazon sees lowest deforestation in 9 years; Brazil must act on UK journalist's murder

Amazon sees lowest deforestation in 9 years; Brazil must act on UK journalist's murder
by AFP Staff Writers
Brasilia (AFP) Nov 7, 2024

The Brazilian Amazon experienced its smallest amount of yearly deforestation in nearly a decade, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's government reported Wednesday, in line with its promise to combat forest loss.

Deforestation fell by 30.6 percent in the year-to-year period beginning in August 2023, according to the National Institute for Space Research (INPE).

During that time, 6,288 square kilometers (2,427 square miles) of forest were destroyed, which INPE Director Gilvan Oliveira said was "the lowest result in the last nine years."

Over the last century, the Amazon rainforest -- which covers nearly 40 percent of South America -- has lost about 20 percent of its area to deforestation, due to the spread of agriculture and cattle ranching, logging and mining, and urban sprawl.

Scientists warn that continued deforestation will put the Amazon on track to reach a point where it will emit more carbon than it absorbs, accelerating climate change.

Lula has pledged to put a stop to illegal deforestation in the Amazon by 2030 but faces an uphill battle against vested interests.

In addition to the Amazon, destruction of the Cerrado, the most species-rich savanna in the world, which is located in central Brazil, was reduced by 25.7 percent or 8,174 square kilometers, INPE reported.

The two different biomes were recently hit by historic drought and the subsequent spread of wildfires.

Mariana Napolitano, strategy director for the World Wildlife Fund in Brazil, called the latest data "good news" but stressed there was more work to be done.

"We need to reforest part of what was destroyed in recent decades, especially in the Amazon's case, which is approaching the point of no return -- losing its capacity to regenerate," she warned.

Environment Minister Marina Silva welcomed the "significant drop" as a part of Brazil's push to reduce carbon emissions, just days before participating in the COP29 UN climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan.

"This reduction is the result of a new understanding that we are making in state politics... in the context that the problem of climate change is already an overwhelming reality in Brazil," she said.

Climate Observatory, a group of environmental NGOs, said in a release that "the numbers are a triumph for the country and a victory for Lula."

Deforestation dramatically worsened under Lula's far-right predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, whose administration saw Amazon deforestation shoot up 75 percent compared to the average of the previous decade.

Brazil must act on probe into UK journalist's murder: media watchdog
Sao Paulo (AFP) Nov 6, 2024 - Brazil must bring to justice all those behind the 2022 double murder of British journalist Dom Phillips and Brazilian Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira, media watchdog Reporters Without Borders urged on Wednesday.

The demand came in the wake of Brazilian federal police on Monday wrapping up a two-year probe into the killings which took place in the Amazon rainforest.

That investigation concluded that Phillips, who freelanced for outlets including The Guardian and The Washington Post, and Pereira were shot dead because of Pereira's monitoring of poaching and other illegal activities going on in the vast Amazon.

It said an alleged mastermind behind the killings was charged for having "supplied the rounds for the perpetration of the crime, provided financial support to the criminal organization's activities and who was involved in coordinating the concealments of the bodies."

While the police report did not name the alleged mastermind, Brazilian media reports identified him as Ruben Dario da Silva Villar, a Colombian national who has been in custody since December 2022 and who is being investigated for illegal fishing and drug trafficking.

Phillips, 57, and Pereira, 41, disappeared on June 5, 2022 while traveling through a remote Indigenous reserve in the Amazon, close to the borders of Colombia and Peru.

Their hacked-up bodies were found and identified days later, after an alleged accomplice confessed to burying them. Autopsies showed they had been shot with shells used for hunting.

According to police, other accomplices took part in the murders and hiding the bodies. Three fishermen were arrested and arraigned for trial.

The killings became a symbol in Brazil and abroad for the corruption and lawlessness fueling the destruction of the Amazon, the world's biggest rainforest, and the dangers faced by journalists and Indigenous experts in the country.

Reporters Without Borders (known by its French initials RSF) said it welcomed the conclusion of the Brazilian police report but stressed all the perpetrators must be put on trial.

"Justice for Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira will only be achieved when all guilty parties are held accountable," said RSF Latin America director Artur Romeu.

"Dom's murder cannot be dismissed as collateral damage to Bruno's death. Both were deliberately targeted by a criminal network operating with impunity in the Amazon."