Violence against Brazil's Indigenous people unabated under Lula, report says

By Anthony Boadle

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Protection of Brazil's Indigenous communities from violence by land grabbers and ranchers was "insufficient" in 2023, according to a report published on Monday, dashing hopes that the situation would improve under leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula.

The Missionary Council for Indigenous Peoples (CIMI), an organization of the Catholic Bishops Conference of Brazil, said the Lula administration's first year in office showed contradictions in its Indigenous policy and disappointing advances in the recognition of ancestral land claims.

While Lula's government resumed the enforcement against illegal invasions of recognized ancestral lands, there were 208 murders of Indigenous people last year, mainly with gunshots, compared to the previous highest number on record of 182 murders in 2020, CIMI said, citing data from the Brazilian health ministry.

The president's office did not immediately respond to a Reuter's request for comment.

CIMI reported the involvement of police in private militias that are being investigated for Indigenous deaths. The police act as escorts for farmers, sharing information and supporting attacks against some communities such as the Guarani and Kaiowá in southern Brazil, according to the report.

Coming after the openly anti-Indigenous government of hard-right President Jair Bolsonaro, Lula started his third term in office on Jan. 1, 2023 by walking up the ramp of the presidential palace arm-in-arm with Brazil's most renowned Indigenous leader, Kayapo chief Raoni Metuktire.

His first measure after swearing in was to create an Indigenous Affairs Ministry for the first time in Brazilian history, headed by an Indigenous woman, Sonia Guajajara.

Lula also ordered a massive operation with police and troops to expel thousands of illegal miners from the Yanomami reservation, Brazil's largest, where the invaders caused a humanitarian crisis with violence, illness and malnutrition.

But Brazil's conservative-leaning Congress also approved a bill limiting Indigenous land claims, even though rights to their ancestral lands are enshrined in the constitution. Lula's partial veto of the bill was overturned by lawmakers with the backing of the powerful farm lobby.

Invasions of Indigenous lands totaled 1,381, mostly in lands in the process of being officially recognized, the report said.

The Lula government formally recognized eight reservations that will be protected by the state, a higher number than in previous years, but "below expectations," CIMI said.

(Reporting by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Aurora Ellis)