Blood found on suspect’s boat in search for British journalist
TRACES of blood have been found on the boat of a suspect arrested in connection with the disappearance of a British journalist and a Brazilian indigenous expert in the Amazon.
Dom Phillips, 57, a regular contributor to The New York Times and The Guardian, and Bruno Pereira, 41, a specialist in indigenous peoples, were reported missing on Sunday.
‘Traces of blood were found on the boat of Amarildo da Costa de Oliveira,’ Brazilian police said in a statement yesterday.
Police did not clarify why he is as a suspect but he is thought to have been among a group of men who threatened the pair near an indigenous territory.
The blood has been sent for analysis. Brazilian authorities said they are hopeful of finding the pair alive but do not exclude any outcome in a region where trafficking is rife. At a vigil outside Brazil’s embassy in London on Thursday, Mr Phillips’ sister, Sian, blamed Brazil’s authorities for delaying the search.
Mr Phillips and Mr Pereira went missing in the Javari Valley in Amazonas state, in the west of the Amazon basin.
Witnesses said they saw the suspect speeding by in a boat in the same direction as the pair when they were last seen.
The remote region is seeing an escalation in armed violence due to the presence of miners, gold diggers, poachers and drug traffickers.