Illegal invasions in the Karipuna Indigenous Territory in the northwest of the Brazilian Amazon have started to advance again, Karipuna leaders told Mongabay following an alert by global nonprofit Survival International.
“This year has been very difficult because there are a lot of people on our territory,” André Karipuna, the chief of the Karipuna people, told Mongabay in an audio message. “We identified new places [that are being invaded], a place that had not been disturbed before and is now being destroyed.”
Karipuna leaders told Mongabay they have reported dozens of new encroachments, especially in the south of the territory, but a response from authorities has been lacking.
In July 2024, Brazil’s federal government carried out an operation to clear invaders from the land. Officials destroyed 17 bridges and 38 illegal access routes as well as other illegal infrastructure, the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples told Mongabay by email. No one was arrested or held responsible. Indigenous leaders say that after the operation, illegal activities and invasions slowly resumed.
According to Global Forest Watch, more than 10,000 hectares (24,700 acres), or 6.6% of the territory, was deforested between 2001 and 2024. It peaked in 2022, with a record forest loss of 2,000 hectares (4,940 acres), and satellite images show a house was built near one of the cleared fields.
In 2024, satellites recorded 194 hectares (480 acres) of forest loss; data for 2025 have not yet been quantified.
Under Brazilian law, invasion or occupation of Indigenous land is a serious criminal offense, backed up by the Constitution and a statute that increases penalties by a third when crimes harm Indigenous people.
But lack of action by authorities has emboldened loggers and land-grabbers in the region to deforest with no expectation of punishment. Indigenous leaders on the ground report feeling frustrated as they continue to report crimes to no avail.
“What did the federal agencies guarantee us? That there would be monitoring and surveillance of our territory,” Adriano Karipuna, one of the Karipuna leaders, told Mongabay in an audio message. “However, that is not happening. And because it is not happening, the invaders are coming back again.”
Numerous Karipuna villages, with thousands of people, lined the Madeira and Purus rivers of Brazil’s Rondônia state in the 19th century, according to historical records. One early document called the region “the Caripuna Nation.”
Colonial violence and disease killed nearly all the Karipuna. Today, just 63 people and one village are still standing.
“These invasions cause countless social, environmental, economic, food-related and cultural impacts,” Adriano Karipuna said. “I feel outraged. … This is a situation that can no longer be tolerated. It simply cannot go on.”
Banner image: Satellite imagery shows a house and cleared field on Karipuna Indigenous land. Image via Google Earth by Emilie Languedoc/Mongabay.
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