Search continues for missing men in Amazon

ATALAIA DO NORTE, Brazil (AP) — The search for an Indigenous expert and a journalist who disappeared in a remote area of Brazil's Amazon continued on Monday following the discovery of a backpack, laptop and other personal belongings submerged in a river.

The items were taken by Federal Police officers by boat to Atalaia do Norte, the closest city to the search, and police said Sunday they had identified the items as belonging to the missing men, including a health card and clothes of Bruno Pereira, the Brazilian Indigenous expert.

The backpack, which was identified as belonging to freelance journalist Dom Phillips of Britain, was found tied to a tree that was half-submerged, a firefighter told reporters in Atalaia do Norte. It is the end of the rainy season in the region and part of the forest is flooded.

Pereira was an adviser to the Univaja Indigenous association and its searchers were still hunting for the men on Monday, according to Orlando Possuelo, a member of the group, Federal police issued a statement denying reports their bodies had been found, though police earlier reported finding traces of blood in the boat of a fisherman who is under arrest as the only suspect in the disappearance.

Last week, officers also found organic matter of apparent human origin in the river. The materials were being analyzed.

Search teams had concentrated their efforts around a spot in the Itaquai river where a tarp from the boat used by the missing men was found Saturday by volunteers from the Matis Indigenous group.

"We used a little canoe to go to the shallow water. Then we found a tarp, shorts and a spoon," one of the volunteers, Binin Beshu Matis, told The Associated Press.

Pereira, 41, and Phillips, 57, were last seen June 5 near the entrance of the Javari Valley Indigenous Territory, which borders Peru and Colombia. They were returning alone by boat on the Itaquai to Atalaia do Norte but never arrived.

That area has seen violent conflicts between fishermen, poachers and government agents. Violence has grown as drug trafficking gangs battle for control of waterways to ship cocaine, although the Itaquai is not a known drug trafficking route.

Authorities have said police are investigating possible links to an international network that pays poor fishermen to fish illegally in the Javari Valley reserve, which is Brazil's secondlargest Indigenous territory.

One of the most valuable targets is the world's largest freshwater fish with scales, the arapaima. It weighs up to 440 pounds and can reach 10 feet. The fish is sold in nearby cities,.

But federal police have not ruled out other lines of investigation, such as drug trafficking.