Calls for Brazil to step up search for missing journalist
AVIGIL was held in central London yesterday for a British journalist and an indigenous affairs official who are missing in the Amazon as Brazilian police question a man over their disappearance.
Well-wishers gathered outside the Brazilian Embassy at around 8am carrying large images of Dom Phillips, who used to live in Bristol, and Bruno Araujo Pereira.
The two men vanished from a remote part of the rainforest more than three days ago, having reportedly last been seen early on Sunday in the Sao Rafael community.
A letter was handed over to the Brazilian ambassador urging them to ask the country’s authorities to ramp up the search operation immediately.
It comes after a suspect named as 41-year-old Amarildo da Costa de Oliveira, also known as Pelado, was arrested for allegedly carrying a firearm without a permit, a common practice in the region.
Police did not clarify why he was being treated as a suspect but he is thought to have been among a group of men who threatened the pair near an indigenous territory on Saturday.
Mr Phillips, a regular contributor to the Guardian, photographed the men following the confrontation after they travelled by river to the territory’s borders, according to the Univaja association of people in the Vale do Javari indigenous territory.
The association’s president, Paulo Marubo, previously said the group had brandished firearms at a Univaja patrol.
Four other people have been questioned since the investigation started but no arrests related to the disappearances have yet been made, according to authorities.
The two men had been due to arrive by boat at nearby Atalaia do Norte on Sunday morning, but never reached the city. Indigenous leaders on the ground, family members and peers of Mr Pereira and Mr Phillips have urged for increased efforts to find them.
Yesterday’s vigil, which was promoted by Greenpeace, came amid reported concerns that there had been little support from the authorities in the search.
Mr Phillips, 57, has reported from Brazil for more than a decade and has been working on a book about preservation of the Amazon.
Mr Pereira has long operated in Javari Valley for the Brazilian indigenous affairs agency as an advocate of the indigenous tribes and had received a number of threats from illegal fisherman and poachers.
On Tuesday, President Jair Bolsonaro was criticised for describing the two men’s work as an “adventure”.
“Really, just two people in a boat in a completely wild region like that is not a recommended adventure. Anything could happen. It could be an accident, it could be that they have been killed,” he said in an interview with television network SBT.
“We hope and ask God that they’re found soon. The armed forces are working hard.”
Brazilian authorities have also been using helicopters to search for the men.