By Hugo Che Piu Deza
Law, Environment and Natural Resources (DAR)
On October 11, 1492, at the end of the 15th century, all the inhabitants of this continent were uncontacted. The following day the first initial contact was made, not by the will of the inhabitants of these territories, but by the initiative of a group of foreigners who sought to become rich by opening a new trade route. They arrived without permission or invitation to some islands and stayed to extract precious minerals from the entire continent, justifying their presence with the purpose of evangelization. The place was the continent that today we all call America and the immediate consequences were the exploitation and decline of the native populations as a result of those abuses and also of the pathogens for which the native populations had no antibodies.
Four hundred years later, at the end of the 19th century, several uncontacted or initially-contacted peoples saw a group of outsiders arriving in their forests seeking to become rich from rubber tapping. They justified their actions by saying that they were bringing civilization to these peoples and patriotism to the farthest reaches of the frontiers. The place was the Peruvian Amazon, causing thousands of Amazonian Indians to lose their lives due to disease and mistreatment. The defense tactic of some of these Amazonian peoples was to move away, moving to more isolated territories, escaping subjugation, exploitation and death.
More than a hundred years later, in the 21st century, the same old ambition to get rich by extracting natural resources (oil, timber, etc.) is once again casting its shadow over the territories inhabited by these isolated Amazonian peoples. The justification – because there is always a justification – is the development of the country, the welfare of the region and even bringing basic services to these towns. However, it is not considered that these peoples still lack defenses and antibodies against the viruses and diseases we carry with us. Those who speak of «development» even say now that indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation do not exist, and they are about to make it so because they seek to continue invading their territories without permission or invitation to take the natural resources they have always sought and leave them the death from which they have always fled. If we do not avoid it, the consequences will also be the same as always: subjugation, exploitation and death.
This decade may be the last time that indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation will encounter extractivism again because there are now so few places left for them to flee or take refuge. But it could also be the end of this inhumane persecution of the territories of indigenous peoples in isolation. May 18, 2023 marked 17 years since the publication of the Law for the Protection of Indigenous or Native Peoples in Isolation and in Initial Contact. The persecution of extractivism against indigenous peoples in isolation even reaches the Congress, where they are trying to weaken the law by accusing it of «unnecessarily limiting the sustainable use of natural resources in these territories and worse, preventing the implementation of public or private investment projects…». I think there is enough decency and historical conscience in the country to say «enough». If the country has more than 128 million hectares and the Peruvian Amazon has more than 70 million hectares, why do we need to extract natural resources precisely in a little more than 4 million hectares[1] where indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation live and move?
We cannot change the past, but we can write the future in a different way. In a way in which the pursuit of wealth for some does not end for others in subjugation, exploitation and death. We can start by preventing a weakening of the legal framework that protects the
[1] The sum of the areas of indigenous and territorial reserves total 4’116,338 hectares.