Amazon tribes turn the tables on intruders with social media

An Indigenous man with a phrase in Portuguese painted on his back that translates to ‘Mining Kills’, participates in a protest against the increase of mining activities that are encroaching on his land, in Brasilia, Brazil. A fast-expanding network of antennae is empowering Indigenous groups to use phones, video cameras and social media to galvanize the public and pressure authorities to respond swiftly to threats from gold miners, landgrabbers and loggers. — AP

RIO DE JANEIRO: It was dusk on April 14 when Francisco Kuruaya heard a boat approaching along the river near his village in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest.

He assumed it was the regular delivery boat bringing gasoline for generators and outboard motors to remote settlements like his. Instead, what Kuruaya found was a barge dredging his people’s pristine river in search of gold.