The Belém Amazon Dialogues, the first summit in 14 years to bring together high-level officials from the governments of eight Amazonian countries, culminated in a comprehensive statement with a strong focus on indigenous peoples, science and regional cooperation.
The mere realization of an event of this magnitude is positive, but it will be nothing more than ink on paper unless a plan is developed with clear goals, a roadmap and resources to implement them.
Saving the Amazon is a race against time. The dangerous mixture of climate change, raw material economy and organized crime poses an existential threat to the largest rainforest on earth. Countries are aware that there are two progressive presidents led by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Gustavo Petro with strong environmental agendas, but most importantly they know that the geopolitical climate in Latin America can change rapidly and that the chances of survival are diminishing The Amazon You are approaching a point of no return.
Despite the differences and tensions between some of the various Amazon countries, there seems to be a consensus on an issue shared by many of the indigenous and civil society participants during my visit to the Belém Summit: a security and security crisis in the Amazon region needs a strong response formulated to counteract environmental crime and violence.
Gustavo Petro, who has been in command for just under a year, proposed an “International Court of Environmental Justice” and dared to speak of an Amazonian NATO of military cooperation. Lula, for his part, pledged to send more federal police across Amazonian borders. “We will make agreements with all neighboring countries,” Lula said. “We will take a strong stance to evict drug dealers, arms dealers and organized crime from our forests in this country. It is a task that we have taken on here.”
The announcements are dramatic and security cooperation strategies carry many risks, especially when they involve armed forces already affected by abuses of power and human rights abuses. For this reason, security strategies must be consulted and agreed upon with the Amazon population and involve non-military government agencies.
The threat posed by the presence and actions of criminal organizations is real and we documented it together with a group of journalists. For more than a year, I led a project called Amazon’s Underworld, which involved nearly 40 media professionals from 11 countries, traveling to every corner of the Amazon to document the presence of armed groups working for illegal industries such as illegal mining, Weapons etc. are responsible for drug trafficking.
What the Amazon Underworld team found is shocking. Criminal organizations control the lives of entire populations, ignoring local authority or acting contrary to it. Due to the absence of the state, violent pressures, and the lack of formal economic systems, men, women, and children often have no choice but to work as laborers for these illegal organizations and activities that wreak havoc on the environment. In fact, we found criminal groups in 70 percent of the communities we surveyed in the border areas of the six main Amazon countries.
Deep in the jungle, and particularly in border areas with minimal state presence, the convergence of illegal activities with legitimate corporations and corrupt elements poses enormous obstacles to the Amazon’s well-being and exacerbates crime’s damaging environmental impact. and the well-being of local communities.
The Amazon has become a violent place. With the possibility of the criminal enterprise portfolio growing, more and more criminal groups are based outside of the Amazon. The lure of illegal profits has a captivating effect on originally urban gangs like the PCC and Comando Vermelho of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, as well as armed groups like Colombian guerrilla organizations.
Armed groups originally came to the Amazon primarily to control drug trafficking and for coca, the main ingredient in cocaine, but stayed for gold, livestock and minerals — and also to launder drug proceeds.
Police forces cannot be excluded from organized crime networks, which we learned the hard way when a military police team intimidated us and forced us to turn in our camera memory cards as we traveled through the Brazilian Amazon. We enter their realm where both criminals and cops are demanding gold payments from illegal miners in order to tolerate and protect this illegal economy that is destroying the rainforest.
So far, authorities have failed miserably in dealing with increasingly complex criminal networks that are spreading their influence across the region. These transnational organizations now engage in a form of criminal diplomacy that would no doubt impress even seasoned politicians, forging cross-border alliances despite their cultural and ideological differences.
The escalation of violence and criminal presence could threaten the mere presence of states in the jungle and international support for economic development, social inclusion and conservation projects in the Amazon.
But all is not lost. The Presidential Summit in Belém provides a fundamental platform for initiating change. There are many actions that States could and should take to improve cooperation and engage local communities and civil society.
Increase government presence in remote areas to promote healthcare, education and economic development. Developing strategies for effective cooperation between security forces, as well as tackling the financial flows behind environmental crime and corruption are some of the essential actions to ensure a safer and more sustainable future for the rainforest.
To contain the attack on the Amazon, cooperation is key and time is running out.
Bram Ebus, senior journalist and coordinator of the Amazon Underworld Investigation
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits