Brazil

BRAZIL

State park transformed into claim mine

Diário de Cuiabá

12th December 2006

Sema and the Environmental Police caught over 100 people illegally mining inside a conservation unit, between Coliza and Cotritriguaçu. Officials from the State Environmental Department (Sema) and the Environmental Police caught over 100 people in an illegal gold mine inside the Igarapés do Juruena State Park (located between the municipalities of Coliza and Cotriguaçu, in the far northeast corner of the state. Four ringleaders were arrested.

The operation took place from the 5th to the 9th of this month. According to Lieutenant Antônio Carlos Costa, one of the coordinators of the operation, the area invaded is quite remote and has suffered widespread devastation from logging and gold mining activities.

"There are craters everywhere and over a thousand cubic meters of all types of timber logged. It looks like something from a horror movie. I was shocked with what they'd done to the park", the policeman said.

Many miners fled into the woods when law enforcement arrived. There were more than a hundred that didn't. "There were so many people that we had to stop arresting them as we didn't have enough personnel to take them all in. That's why we decided to arrest the four ringleaders and take all of their equipment with us".

The names of those arrested are Cícero Francisco de Souza, Jolmar Simionatto, Josenilton Silva dos Santos and Luiz Sérgio Otto. The officers confiscated 15 motors, six trucks and a tracked tractor.

"Each one of them led a group of at least 60 miners", says Costa, who discovered where they all came from. "They came mainly from the states of Amazonas and Rondônia. There are people from all over, they came attracted by the gossip".

Gossip, in claim miner's lingo is news that is transmitted by word of mouth about some new promising mining area. The discover that Igarapés do Juruena had become the focus of this gossip was made possible by satellite images.

According to Sema, a technical report, together with a police inquiry, will be sent to the State Public Prosecutors Office to initiate and investigation.

Land-grabbing

Established by a state decree in 2002, Igarapés do Juruena shelters an area of 227,000 hectares, rich in water and diversity of fauna and flora. According to a survey by the Sema Coordinating Office of Conservation Units (CUCO), the park has been targeted by organized land-grabbers. Management plan frauds have also been discovered, trying to legalize timber taken from the park.