Brazil indigenous form patrols to guard forests

In the early hours of the morning, indigenous men from the Tembé group start preparing for the mission ahead by dancing, singing and painting their faces.

The group of 40 men from the Ka'Azar Guardians of the Forest Patrol and are responsible for protecting their indigenous land against illegal loggers, gold miners and others.

"We created guardians, so these young men can inspect the land, to show where the invasions and illegal loggers were," says chief of the Tenetehara indigenous land Sérgio Muxi Tembé.

Carrying guns, bows and arrows and chainsaws, they use motorbikes to travel across the land.

In pairs, while patrolling the area, they also have to clear out fallen trees and logs left by illegal loggers to obstruct their path, making their journey twice as long.

After some time, the group finds a logger, Altemir Freitas, near a Piquiarana tree, very valuable in the logging market, already cut.

Initially, he denied being a logger but after some questioning, he agreed to take the indigenous patrol to a nearby illegal loggers camp.

When arriving at the camp, they find a group of six illegal loggers and a cook with her son.

The indigenous men photograph and record with their phones and talk to the loggers, peacefully asking them to leave and explaining why their activity harms both the environment and their indigenous group.

Created in 1946 with an area of 2.809 hectares, the Alto Rio Guamá indigenous land is home to around 2500 indigenous people.

The indigenous patrol is formed by 40 men of all villages in this land.

The patrol started with the help of WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) and other international organisations to act against the invasion of illegal loggers in areas with constant threat of deforestation.

In the beginning, the group constantly destroyed machines and camps used by invaders, but after many death threats and ambushes the Federal Public Attorney's office recommended that they focus on monitoring, alerting and recording any invasions together with federal institutions like FUNAI (National Indigenous Foundation) and IBAMA (Environment and Natural Resources Brazilian Institute).

Ronaldo Tembé, one of the indigenous guardians sent a message to the Brazilian president: "We want Bolsonaro to respect us, respect our culture, respect our land, respect our survival inside our indigenous land."

The indigenous patrol gains even more importance in face of increasing criticism by national and international environment organisations about the lack of action by President Jair Bolsonaro's government against illegal logging, gold miners and other threats to the Amazon forest.