Pleas to leave lost Amazon tribe alone

[link to www.news.com.au]

APPEALS have been made to leave alone the members of one of Brazil's last uncontacted Indian tribes, spotted in the Amazon jungle near the Peruvian border.

The Indians were sighted and photographed from an aircraft or helicopter during flights over the rainforest in remote Acre state, said Brazil's National Indian Foundation, known as Funai.

Funai said it photographed "strong and healthy" warriors, six huts and a large planted area.

The photographs show red-painted tribe members brandishing bows and arrows.

Funai said it was not known to which tribe they belonged.

"Four distinct isolated peoples exist in this region, whom we have accompanied for 20 years," Funai expert Jose Carlos Meirelles Junior said.

"We did the overflight to show their houses, to show they are there, to show they exist," he said.

"This is very important because there are some who doubt their existence."

The tribe spotted recently is one of the last not to be contacted by officials.

Funai does not make contact with such tribes and prevents invasions of their land to ensure their autonomy, the foundation said.

Survival International said the Indians were in danger from illegal logging in Peru, which is driving uncontacted tribes over the border and could lead to conflict with the estimated 500 uncontacted Indians now living on the Brazilian side.

There are more than 100 uncontacted tribes worldwide, most of them in Brazil and Peru, the group said.

"These pictures are further evidence that uncontacted tribes really do exist," Survival director Stephen Corry said.

"The world needs to wake up to this, and ensure that their territory is protected in accordance with international law. Otherwise, they will soon be made extinct."

Mr Meirelles described the threats to such tribes and their land as "a monumental crime against the natural world" and "further testimony to the complete irrationality with which we, the 'civilised' ones, treat the world", the BBC reported.

One Australian-based linguist says the tribe should be left alone.

LaTrobe University professor Alexandra Aikhenvald said contact with white people had not brought much good to indigenous tribes in history so far.

"My reaction is excitement because it is always extremely interesting to see new peoples being discovered," she told ABC radio.

"But I think they would be extremely scared after seeing the aircraft.

"They may just leave because they may have this idea that is some sort of gigantic bird that wants to engulf them all or that it is some sort of invaders or anything like that caution and care."

Ms Aikhenvald doubts the tribe has never had contact with white people, but says it is not impossible.

"Many of them had contact with white people at different times in the past but basically in the 19th Century and then during the rubber boom, many of them just fled," she said.

"Maybe they are descendants of those groups that fled from white supremacy maybe 100 or more years ago."