Friday, 18 February 2005Brazil's president ordered the creation of two massive new rain forest reserves, succumbing to intense pressure to protect a lawless Amazon region from violent loggers and ranchers after the killing last weekend of an American nun who fought to protect the jungle.
The decrees signed Thursday by President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will form a reserve of 3.3 million hectares (8.2 million acres) and a national park spanning 445,300 hectares (1.1 million acres) in the state of Para, where 73-year-old Dorothy Stang was shot to death in a dispute with a powerful rancher.
"We can't give in to people committing acts of violence," said Environment Minister Marina Silva, who announced the decrees in Brasilia, the capital. "The government is putting the brakes on in front of the predators."
The decrees came after more than 60 environmental and human rights groups signed a letter to Silva demanding strong action to curb "violence and impunity associated to the illegal occupation of lands and deforestation" in the Amazon - especially in Para.
Unless the killing stops, Brazil's first elected leftist president "will risk making history as the champion of rural violence, illegal occupation of public lands and illegal logging," said the letter, signed by the World Wide Fund for Nature, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and other groups.
Stang, a naturalized Brazilian originally from Dayton, Ohio, was attacked Saturday in a settlement 48 kilometers (30 miles) from Anapu, located in Para. A witness said she read from a Bible after being confronted by two gunmen and was then shot six times at close range.
Though environmentalists were pleased with the decrees, they said they have lobbied Silva's administration for similar moves for two years and were dismayed they came only after Stang's death.
"It is sad to see that things had been in the pipeline for months and years needed a tragic development in order receive priority," said Roberto Smeraldi, director of the environmental group Friends of the Earth Brazil.
The president also ordered a six-month moratorium on logging licenses on 8.2 million hectares (20.3 million acres) of land in Para near a jungle road scheduled to be paved in an area that environmentalists say is already rife with deforestation and land conflicts.
During the moratorium, environmental authorities will define which areas should be protected. Paving the road, known as BR163, would give farmers in the top soy producing state of Mato Grosso access to an Amazon River port in Para for cheaper shipment abroad. The road is currently impassable to heavy trucks for much of the year because of constant rain.
But environmentalists and activists for poor Brazilian farmers say paving the road without stringent development planning will usher in a new wave of clashes between peasants, land speculators, ranchers and loggers - leading to more deforestation to clear land for cattle grazing and soy plantations unless steps are taken to prevent violence.
Critics who had claimed Silva has favored Brazil's advanced agricultural industry instead of the environment and the poor during his first two years in office praised the decrees as positive moves.
"What's at issue here is the future of the Amazon," said Stephan Schwartzman of the New York City-based Environmental Defense group. "The protection plan signals the government's intention to exert control over one of the most lawless and violent regions in the Amazon frontier."
The reserves will be linked to Amazon forests already under protection, creating what Schwartzman described as the world's largest tropical forest reserve.
Lawlessness has long been common in huge Para state, where ranchers, backed by hired gunmen, ensnare poor workers in an endless cycle of debt akin to slavery. Small landowners also face eviction at gunpoint so the land can be resold to investors keen on planting soy.
Tensions were further enflamed when the government recently ordered ranchers to evacuate land they occupied but couldn't prove they owned. Ranchers and loggers blocked roads and rivers, and the government relented, allowing ranchers with dubious claims to the land to continue logging.
In Anapu, helicopters on Thursday flew in 110 jungle combat soldiers to join a police manhunt for four men accused of killing Stang. They set up camp near the graveyard where Stang was buried this week.
For the town's 7,000 residents, the arrival of the troops was both a relief and another reminder of how much the situation had deteriorated in Para, 900 milaes (1,500 kilometers) northwest of Brasilia, the capital.
The troops are part of a larger operation involving 2,000 soldiers sent in this week to keep the peace around Para. At least three other people have been killed in the region since Stang's murder.
"Sadly, it's necessary. Calling in the Army should only be the last resort," said Rev. Andoni Ledesma, a Spanish priest tracking the police investigation for the Roman Catholic Church-linked Land Pastoral group, which helps landless farmers throughout Brazil. |
Friday, 18 February 2005
Associated Press via Jerusalem Post
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