[IPSM] Brazil may open Indigenous lands to mining

[hhazel at gmail.com]

Brazil may open Indian lands to mining
By: Dorothy Kosich
Posted: '10-MAR-05 05:00' GMT (c) Mineweb 1997-2004

TORONTO--(Mineweb.com) The Brazilian government is considering
regulatory reform that would open more aboriginal territories to
mining and mining exploration.

In a question and answer session following his presentation this to
the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada, Dr. Miguel Nery,
Director-General of Brazil's DNPM, the National Department of Mineral
Production, said his agency is working on opening up mining in
indigenous lands.

A 20-member delegation comprised of Brazilian government officials and
miners doing business in Brazil attended PDAC and hosted a special
workshop on mineral exploration.

Nery's remarks come in the wake of an incident last May when Cinta
Larga Indians massacred 29 diamond miners in the Roosevelt Indian
Reserve in Brazil's Amazon rain forest. In the meantime, a member of a
government task force working to stop illegal diamond mining on Indian
reservations was killed as October.

The killings of the garimpeiros came after a four-year diamond rush to
the Roosevelt Reservation by miners across Brazil. It is believed that
the reservation may host South America's largest diamond resources.
While mechanized mining is illegal in Indian territory, thousands of
miners have illegally prospected and mined on Indian lands. The
Indians also began mining illegally including the Cinta Larga Indians.
Brazil's Mines and Energy Ministry estimated that $2 billion worth of
diamond have been mined on the 2.7-million-hectacre reserve. It is
believed that a dispute over mining revenues may have resulted in the
killings, according to federal police.

Ironically, the same laws which protected the Indians from
prosecutions for the murders also designates them as wards of the
state, denied of the rights of other Brazilians, particularly when it
comes to mining concessions or keeping mining out of reservations. The
Cinta Larga Tribe has 1,300 members, about half of whom speak
Portuguese. Under Brazilian law, the ability of an individual to speak
Portuguese and the degree of his or her exposure to Brazilian society
are factors in determining eligibility for full citizenship and
constitutional rights.

The massacre resurrected questions of who owns the region's mineral
resources, what law applies on the reservation, and how to explore and
mine while preserving the ancient culture of the Cinta Larga and other
tribes.

Nery told the audience of mostly Brazilian mining and exploration
professionals that the government's goal is to revisit the Roosevelt
Reserve matter including the removal of the roadblocks which are used
at all access roads and navigable rivers out of the reserve.

Dr. Telton Correa, Coordinator-General of the Department of Geology
and Mining Policy of the Ministry of Mines and Energy, said the
government intends to free some of these lands for exploration and
mining "under certain conditions."

The special status of Brazil's Indians has prevented them from
entering into contracts, starting businesses, or even having much
control over their traditional lands and resources. Their resources
are under the management of FUNAI, a system similar to that of the
U.S. Department of Interior's management of Indian lands. The use of
water and mining resources by third parties are considered the sole
exception to the rights of indigenous communities to use natural
resources on their lands. However, the government must consult with
these communities concerning mining activities.

The regulatory reform now under consideration may include a mining
royalty for the tribes for activities on Indian reserves.

The former government official who was considered a vital link between
the Cinta Larga and the Brazilian government was shot and killed at an
ATM last October. Apoena Meireles, the first non-Indian to make
contact with the tribe in 1967, wanted to persuade them to stop mining
until the government had reformed legislation regulating mining on
Indian lands.