The Observer’s convenient omissions
by Matthew
To Mr. Mereilles, a government official in charge of monitoring isolated Indians on Brazil’s western frontier, The Observer article must have been even more of a shock than the astounding photographs themselves. In it, he is wrongly alleged to have misled the world. His letter of correction is below, including the sections, in red, that the Observer chose to leave out in publication.
Dear Editor,
Your article (”Secret of the ‘lost’ tribe that wasn’t”, June 22) completely distorts the work I have been doing on behalf of the Brazilian government for the last two decades, to defend the isolated Indian groups of Acre state, Brazil.
I find it very surprising that you did not talk to me before publishing an inaccurate article that suggests I misled people about the uncontacted tribe whose photos were published around the world.
I have not ‘admitted’ that the tribe was known about before we took the photos of them. I have always made that perfectly clear. The statement we released together with the photos contains a statement from me that ‘In this region there are four distinct isolated tribes, that we have monitored for twenty years’.
Your writer is confusing ‘uncontacted’ ‹ that is, no contact with outside society ‹ with ‘undiscovered’. No-one who works in this field would ever describe the many isolated tribes in the Amazon as ’undiscovered’, as we have a good idea where most of them are. But that does not mean that we make contact with them - quite the contrary, we are monitoring their territory to make sure no outsiders can enter.
Your article, by suggesting there was something dishonest about the photos, has made our job harder, and will be used by the Indians’ many enemies.
Yours sincerely,
José Carlos dos Reyes Meirelles Jr,
FUNAI Coordinator of the Ethno-environmental protection zone, Envira River, Acre, Brazil
The damage that this article has done is difficult to measure, yet we can be sure that it has set back the fight for tribal peoples’ rights. It sits proudly at the summit of journalistic irresponsibility.
Despite this, The Observer maintains the original article, without any corrections, on its website, acting as a reference to anyone hoping to ‘prove’ that the uncontacted tribe photographed from the air in early 2008, wasn’t.
September 11th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
I feel it is a shame that such attention is ever brought about. I myself grew up in a Wayana village, in Suriname for several years and heard many stories of the “unfriendly indians” called the Akurios (Akulio). I was even told where you could most likely find them. Never in my life will I ever attempt to, nor will I ever share this information with anyone. It has always been man’s desire to explore the unknown. When they are ready, they will do exploration of their own. Assuming however, that they survive these turbulent times.