BRAZIL
Land ownership rights continue to torment the many Indian tribes living in this country. Estranged from their own land and forced to adopt alien customs, distressed Brazilian Indians have turned to committing suicide. Over the last 10 years, some 200 Kaiowa Indians, a sub-group of Guarani Indians, have killed themselves and anthropologists say that suicides are becoming more frequent in other tribes too.
The Kaiowa Indians have watched their land shrink from 40,225 sq km in 1945 to the present 277 sq km. They are also witness to the steady disappearance of their language and culture.
Late last year, the minister of justice, Nelson Jobim pledged to return 1,620 ha to the Kaiowa tribe. This has not happened to date as the 40 colonists refuse to leave the land. Kaiowa Indians live near Dourados, an agribusiness centre where they are unable to fend for themselves in less than 0.405 ha per person.
dominica: A beautiful tropical island in eastern Caribbean, the nation has caught the fancy of the Australian mining giant, Broken Hill Proprietary ( bhp ) for its mining potential. Dominican residents apprehend that bhp could mar the island's tourism capabilities and also pave the way for the destruction of their rainforests.
bhp has applied for exploration permits to scale 10 per cent of Dominica's land constituting an area of 75 sq km of protected rainforests. The permits, if provided, would allow the mining company to build roads and also conduct drilling operations in two important forest reserves.
Dominican greens argue against the bhp proposal. With mining disasters occurring often in neighbouring Latin America, they contend that similar destruction could have a greater impact on their tiny nation. "Environmental disasters of the scale we see in Papua New Guinea or the Omai cyanide spill in Guyana, could simply wipe out Dominica,' warns Atherton Martin, president, Dominica Conservation Association.
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