#ava guarani people

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Avá-Guarani Indigenous people are a target of violent attacks in southern Brazil

In a new attack, big farmers kill the communities' domestic animals and spray pesticides around the houses

The Avá-Guarani community, located in the Tekoha Guasu Guavira Indigenous Land in Guaíra, in the state of Paraná, was the target of yet another violent attack by big farmers on Thursday morning (17). The conflict left two Indigenous people injured, one after being run over by a truck and the other beaten with sticks by men identified as employees of a rural property in the region.   

Based on reports from residents of the community, a truck and four tractors loaded with poison advanced on the Yvyju Avary community, inside the Indigenous Land, at around 10 am, allegedly at the behest of a big farmer who is demanding the expulsion of the Indigenous people from the area. The National Public Security Force was called in to intervene, and the victims were taken to a hospital. “The big farmers have a truck full of non-Indigenous people making attacks. They've run over people and also killed the community's dogs,” said Indigenous leader Nazany Martins.   

According to the Guarani Yvyrupa Commission (CGY, in Portuguese), the Avá-Guarani community live in constant tension due to big farmers' attacks against Indigenous territories that are being regularized. One big farmer in the region agreed to negotiate the sale of his land for the demarcation of the Indigenous Lands, while another chose to resist violently, escalating the conflicts.   

This attack is part of a series of aggressions that have been taking place in recent months. Last Sunday (13), the Y'hovy village, also in Guaíra, was shot at from a neighboring big farm after a suspicious car drove around the area filming Indigenous leaders. Although no one was injured in the incident, the atmosphere of insecurity persists.   

Continue reading.

[kiragecko]

Okay, so I'm designing a bunch of hidden magical cities. It needs to be at least slightly believable that they haven't been discovered in a world with satellite photography and high population density. I have ideas for most of them, but am struggling with a few. Anyone want to offer suggestions?

 (They are, of course, based on 10th C civilizations.)

 Strong Ideas:

Eriu/Irish - A Crannog! Crannogs were manmade islands, sometimes connected to the mainland with a causeway. They were built for defense, out of reeds, mud, and anything available. Buildings and walls are stone or wood. I'm thinking these guys made a hollow one and are living inside it, with the causeway acting as a tunnel.

Gurjaraka/Indian - Cliffside village in mountains. Earthquake(?) broke open the land they were on, leaving them in a hidden ravine. Buildings are stone.

Nihonzin/Japanese - Caves in the Izu Islands or some similar location. Small and remote enough that no one really visits, but close enough to the main islands for earlier cultural connection to be realistic. Wooden buildings.

Nehirawak/Cree - Not hidden, but they're in northern Manitoba so it doesn't matter. Nomadic, travelling on rivers and lakes other than the major ones. Haven't chosen between birchbark or skin for buildings.

 Okay Ideas:

Kamvuja/Khmer - Buildings swallowed by trees. Major stone buildings are surrounded by tree roots of trees that have grown over them. Smaller building constructed partially FROM the trees? I have not decided if this is awesome or unrealistic, but images of Angkorian ruins give me IDEAS.

Maya - Cenote and connected cave system. Strong visual, but I'm worried about the religious aspect. Maya still worship at cenotes (sinkholes that fill with water), since they serve as doorways to the afterworld. No amount of - twilit stone buildings partially obscured by hanging vines and spotlit by a beam of light from the surface - is worth it, if I can't figure out if the setting is respectful. (Talking to people is SO HARD)

Filastiniyyun/Arab - Petra-esque carved-from-mountains location, but Jerusalem/Classical Islamic design? The Nabateans were Arab, so there is a connection, and Palestine is densely populated enough that I'm not sure what else could work. I would like an idea more connected to the time period, though. Even if cities carved from rock are THE BEST.

No Ideas:

Ava/Guarani - There are still groups of Guarani with no contact. I don't need to make up anything. Which ups the pressure to do it RIGHT.

Cholungo(?)/Moche - Semi-coastal Northern Peru. High stone walls surrounding neighbourhoods. Stone buildings. Usually built in river valleys. Trade with mountain neighbours and by sea.

Zanji/Waswahili - Coastal E. Africa, including islands. Buidings were a mix of coral stone and wood. A lot of ocean trade, so a harbour would be valuable.

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Avá-Guarani Indigenous people sieged by glyphosate in Brazil

The case was used in Germany as an example in the accusation of human rights violations committed by Bayer

About 4,000 Avá-Guarani Indigenous individuals live in the far west of the state of Paraná at risk of glyphosate contamination. The substance is the active ingredient in Roundup, the world's best-selling pesticide for eliminating weeds from crops and even public spaces.

Headaches, dizziness, itchy patches on the skin and diseases such as cancer have become part of Avá-Guarani's routine in recent years. "When they spray poison, a lot of people get headaches and go to the health center more frequently. Every time they use poison, we face a set of medical problems. In the long term, some people had cancer. We've never had that [before],” says Celso Japoty Alves, an Avá-Guarani leader and former cacique – Indigenous leader of a specific Indigenous community – of the Ocoy Indigenous community in the town of São Miguel do Iguaçu. 

The community is one of three Avá-Guarani communities demarcated as Indigenous territory by the federal government. Even so, it does not guarantee security for residents. 

"We're being harmed because there's no land protection regarding this issue. There is no green area. The machine has been spraying poison and various pesticides next to Indigenous communities, affecting our houses and crops, which we aren’t able to maintain. When they spray poison and rain comes, it reaches Indigenous communities,” says Alves.

Continue reading.

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Avá-Guarani Indigenous people suffer due to pesticide spraying and the destruction of their crops in a new attack in Brazil

Protected by police cars, a tractor drove over plantations and dumped poison near a housing site

“We're going to die here, but we're not going to go back,” says an Indigenous leader who will not be identified for security reasons, after yet another attack on the Yvyju Avary community of the Avá-Guarani Indigenous people, between the municipalities of Guaíra and Terra Roxa, in western Paraná state. The area is part of Tekoha Guasu Guavira Indigenous Land.

In an attack on Thursday (23), a tractor drove over crops and sprayed pesticides near the Indigenous houses. "The children are feeling sick. They have stomach aches and nausea,” says an Indigenous woman, whose name won’t be revealed for safety concerns. The Avá-Guarani people recorded videos of the convoy's arrival, which, in addition to the tractor, was made up of a truck, a van and two Military Police cars. The vehicles drove ahead, while the tractor got close to the houses spraying poison.

This is the second attack on the site in less than a week. On October 17, a truck and four tractors loaded with pesticides advanced on the community, allegedly at the behest of a landowner who is demanding the expulsion of the Indigenous people from the area. The rural property overlaps the Indigenous territory. 

“All we managed to save that day was destroyed today,” the woman laments. 

According to the Guarani Yvyrupa Commission (CGY, in Portuguese), the Avá-Guarani community lives in constant tension due to attacks by agribusiness people on Indigenous territories in the process of being regularized. One of the businessmen in the region agreed to negotiate the sale of his land for the demarcation of the Indigenous land, while another chose to resist violently, escalating the conflicts, which have been intensifying since July.

Continue reading.

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Indigenous Guarani live in deepening poverty in Brazil

In the middle of a football match on an improvised dirt pitch in southern Brazil, a famished young Indigenous boy abruptly abandons the game, throws a stick into the sky and fells a bird.

Then he runs home to have his family cook it.

Scenes like this leave chief Inacio Martins saddened.

"Hunger's no fun," says the 51-year-old head of the Ava Guarani people in the village of Marangatu, where some 200 Indigenous families live in deep poverty.

Their situation is similar to that of many native communities in Brazil, where far-right President Jair Bolsonaro -- whose political fate will be decided in a polarizing runoff election Sunday -- came to office four years ago vowing not to allow "one more centimeter" of protected Indigenous reservations.

"We need land to farm. We know how, but the soil here is nothing but rock," says Martins, pointing to the dusty expanse surrounding the community's overcrowded huts.

"Where are we going to go?" he asks. "It used to be we'd run away whenever white people came to take our land. Now there's no land left to run to."

Continue reading.