Brazil agencies launch raid against illegal gold miners in Yanomami lands

An agent of the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA), looks on as a plane and a house belonging to miners are destroyed during an operation conducted jointly within Brazil's National Indian Foundation (FUNAI) and Brazilian National Public Security Force against illegal mining in Yanomami indigenous land in Roraima state, Brazil February 6, 2023. IBAMA/Handout via REUTERS

BOA VISTA, Brazil (Reuters) - Brazil's environmental and indigenous agencies have launched an enforcement operation in the Amazon rainforest to expel thousands of illegal gold miners blamed for causing a humanitarian crisis among the Yanomami people, officials said on Wednesday.

Armed agents of the government's environmental protection agency Ibama, deployed by helicopter and motor boat since Monday, have arrested and removed dozens of miners in Brazil's largest indigenous reservation on the northern border with Venezuela.