"Human remains" have been found in the searches of the
British journalist, Dom Phillips
, and of the
Brazilian anthropologist, Bruno Araújo
, who disappeared eleven days ago in the western Amazon: this was confirmed by the Brazilian Minister of Justice, Anderson Torres, after yesterday brothers Oseney da Costa de Oliveira, known as 'Dos Santos', and Amarildo da Costa Oliveira, known as 'Pelado', confessed to having killed them and made their bodies disappear.
The bodies, which have meanwhile been collected by federal police officers, had been hidden by the alleged killers in a
difficult-to-access
jungle area .
Phillips and Pereira had been missing since June 5, when they were last seen in the municipality of Sao Rafael, from where they left by boat for Atalaia do Norte, in the state of Amazonas.
For the police commissioner, Eduardo Fontes, it was a "
heinous crime
".
The double murder took place in the Vale do Javarí, near the border with Peru and Colombia, where there is
a reserve of indigenous people harassed by gold miners, drug traffickers and illegal fishermen
.
Phillips, 57, a contributor to The Guadian newspaper, and Araújo, 41, a former official of the National Indian Foundation (Funai), were researching the plight of some tribes and had received
threats for their work
.
The posters for the search for the two missing professionals
Investigators have specified that
one of the lines of investigation in progress tries to reveal if there was someone who financed the crime
.
"Peru is the second largest cocaine producer in the world and it is in this region of the forest that Farc (Colombian guerrilla) dissidents take refuge", underlined Fontes.
Phillips' wife, Alessandra Sampaio, has urged swift investigations into the case, while
indigenous representatives denounce the lack of security in the forest
.
"Even if we await the final confirmations, this tragic outcome puts an end to the anguish of not knowing where Dom and Bruno are: now we can take them home and bid them goodbye with love," said the woman.
"The increase in conflicts in indigenous lands is mainly caused by illegal extractors, which have increased in recent years, creating a scenario of environmental violence and devastation," said indigenous MP, Joenia Wapichana, of the environmental party Rede Sustainability.
