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Brazil prepares to get rid of prohibited Amazon gold miners from Munduruku land

Brazilian authorities are preparing to get rid of unlawful gold miners from a Native reservation in the Amazon jungle that has been crisscrossed with informal airstrips and polluted with mercury, an authorities said.

The Munduruku territory covers nearly 24,000 square km ( 9,000 square miles), about the size of the U.S. state of New Hampshire, and is home to 61 villages of Munduruku, Apiacas and other Native groups in an area understood for violent land conflicts.

The Munduruku reservation has the second-most illegal mining in Brazil, according to a report seen from government company Censipam, which manages operations protecting the Amazon.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has vowed to fight prohibited mining on Indigenous lands after a rise under his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro.

Illegal gold miners have actually poisoned rivers and triggered public health crises on Native reservations, which are the responsibility of the federal government.

The planned operation will involve federal bodies from the Defense Ministry to Native affairs agency Funai, Nilton Tubino, who has been collaborating similar efforts in the Yanomami area in far northern Brazil, informed Reuters.

The Yanomani area, where prohibited miners have also been vectors for malaria and other infectious disease, has seen the most illegal mining, Censipam says.

Authorities have determined 21 informal airstrips in the Munduruku area providing products for mining activity, the Censipam report showed. Turbino said the operation would aim to cut supplies for prohibited activities in collaboration with Brazil's. fuel and aviation regulators.

The Censipam report showed that 388 brand-new unlawful mining areas. opened in the Munduruku area in 2022, the in 2015 of the. Bolsonaro administration, being up to 128 last year and 23 up until now. this year.

Tubino stated the federal government would prevent inflaming any. disputes with the operation.

(source: Reuters)