- Report presented by ORAU, DAR and ProPurús on the situation of the Indigenous Reserves in Ucayali, identifies the increase of illicit activities in territories that put the PIACI at risk and expose them to forced contacts.
- The report complements a previous document on Human Rights Defenders in Ucayali, carried out by the three organizations, which identified the existence of at least 113 communities throughout the Ucayali region, whose lands or forests are at risk from these illicit activities.
On the basis of a joint effort between the Regional Organization AIDESEP Ucayali (ORAU), the Civil Association Law, Environment and Natural Resources (DAR), and the ProPurús Association, a report entitled «State of the Indigenous Reserves in Ucayali: Rapid Diagnosis and Proposals» was recently published. The document is based on cartographic, satellite, and field information with emphasis on the scope of the Murunahua Indigenous Reserve, to evidence the situation of lack of protection and latent threats to Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and in Initial Contact Situation (PIACI) in the Ucayali region.
A key message left by the PIACI Report of ORAU, DAR and ProPurús, is that strategic state actions (multilevel) and cross-border coordination are needed. It is clear that the special cross-sectoral regime has serious limitations, and current tools such as the sanctioning regime for non-compliance with the PIACI Law must be applied more effectively. In this scenario, it goes without saying that the bet is the strengthening of the administration of the indigenous and territorial reserves. Thus, priorities should be focused on addressing this emergency that puts in suspense the present and future of the native communities themselves, in addition to the PIACI.
As is well known, the PIACI are indigenous peoples who, in the exercise of their right to self-determination, have restricted, limited or are in the process of relating, to multiple degrees, with agents external to the territorial spaces they inhabit or through which they move. Considering the negative potential of the relationship with third parties, the Peruvian regulatory framework headed by Law No. 28736 – PIACI Law has recognized the figure of indigenous reserves as delimited lands to protect their rights, their habitat and the conditions that ensure their existence and integrity as peoples.
Currently, there are five (5) indigenous reserves and two (2) territorial reserves in the country, five (5) of these seven (7) reserves cover or are in the jurisdiction of Ucayali. Likewise, in order to guarantee the protection and survival of these peoples, the aforementioned PIACI Law established the special transsectoral regime that is in charge of the Vice-Ministry of Interculturality, of the Ministry of Culture. However, the information collected in the field shows limitations in the surveillance of indigenous reserves, as well as the existence and increase of multiple pressures associated with illicit activities such as illegal logging or drug trafficking.
The study highlights that since mid-2018 the presence of different groups of land traffickers and people dedicated to illicit crops, settled in tributaries or sub-tributaries of the Inuya and Mapuya basins, within the scope of the Murunahua Indigenous Reserves, became notorious. These nuclei, which come from the Andean region and the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valley (VRAEM), would be associated with the different drug trafficking networks that operate in Ucayali and that could compete with each other. These settlements, which are composed mostly of mestizo people and some indigenous people, settled mainly in Manitsi, Openpemashi, Flor de Contayo and Nuevo Renaco.
Likewise, the report indicates that since 2018 there are repeated reports from the neighboring communities, about sightings of unknown planes that, between 3:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m., move at low altitude and do not carry visible identification. In the information collected, there are references that in all sightings, the planes enter the Murunahua Indigenous Reserve, and leave it in the direction of Brazil. This situation would be repeated in the area of other Indigenous Reserves such as the Kakataibo, as it has also been denounced by local federations.
These are not isolated events. There are recent journalistic investigations that account for the increase in pressures associated with drug trafficking in border areas between Peru and Brazil, as well as between Peru, Brazil and Colombia., involving criminal organizations such as cartels and others, which put in a state of anxiety the PIACI that inhabit these spaces, as well as the native communities themselves that are threatened or against whose reprisals are taken that limit their ability to denounce.
See PIACI Report: https://bit.ly/3s1X4JX
See Report on Human Rights Defenders: https://bit.ly/3gOkKIL
Watch PIACI Report presentation recording: https://bit.ly/45lqZep