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Altamira, Brazil (CNN) - We embark on a helicopter of the Brazilian Armed Forces quartered in the 51st Battalion of the Selva de Altamira, a municipality in the Amazonian State of Pará, in the north of Brazil, where a struggle has been fought for decades, often violent, for control of the land. Security forces face miners and stealth loggers. The landowners of the agricultural business collide with the peasants and indigenous groups. Between them, the main collateral victim is nature, devastated by a chainsaw and heavy machinery.
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Today's mission is to fly over the jungle in search of areas of illegal deforestation, fires and clandestine mining.
From the air, the first areas devastated by the greed of the human being can be quickly seen: deep wounds in this jungle sanctuary.
Aerial view of deforestation in the Menkragnoti indigenous territory in Altamira, state of Pará, in the Amazon of Brazil. (JOAO LAET / AFP / Getty Images)
By flying over the Ituna-Itatá indigenous land, the military distinguishes a clandestine airstrip. Its width and length allows the takeoff and landing of medium-sized aircraft. According to the operations coordinator of the Brazilian Institute of the Environment (IBAMA), Hugo Loss, it is possible that the gigantic strip of ocher land in the middle of the jungle serves to transport the gold extracted from the illegal mines or to load seeds that will later be launched from the air over large deforested areas: a quick way to plant grass that will later serve as food for the heads of cattle raised illegally in a territory banned from agricultural activity.
We also observe some irregular homes, large areas of razed vegetation and still latent fires ... the panoramic view is shocking.
With these overflights, the Brazilian Army manages to identify the jungle areas where environmental crimes are being committed. Then transmit this information to other institutions that will go to the field to investigate the facts.
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IBAMA usually leads these ground operations in Altamira during these days. CNN accompanies a patrol of prosecutors of the institution that, supported by soldiers of the National Force, enters the restricted area of Ituna-Itatá. According to the National Indian Foundation of Brazil (FUNAI), communities of uncontacted indigenous people live in this vast territory of more than 140,000 hectares. So far they have not been able to quantify them or identify ethnicities.
The caravan of off-road vehicles crosses the heart of the jungle for more than four hours along a dirt road that makes its way between centuries-old chestnut trees and thick vegetation, at times devastated by humans. The members of the operation run the risk of facing melee clashes with loggers and stealth miners, and therefore the members of the National Force circulate armed with war weapons.
Agents arrive in devastated areas with the unmistakable mark of tractors equipped with drag chains. We also found an abandoned clandestine camp. Prosecutors have come too late to arrest the people who worked in this place. There is also no trace of the machinery used.
Aerial view of an informal gold mining camp in Altamira, Brazil. (JOAO LAET / AFP / Getty Images)
The environmental destruction observed on the ground is of great magnitude. According to IBAMA, some 400 hectares of indigenous territory have been razed. "The objective of these people is to consolidate the occupation of this area to try to guarantee the possession of the land, wait for a future regularization and then speculate with its sale," IBAMA environmental agent Gouvinda Terra explains to CNN, while observing the devastation. around it.
Father Amaro Lopes, head of Altamira of the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT), a Catholic organization that defends the rights of rural and indigenous workers, as well as the legal shield of the Amazon, argues that “the indigenous people are dying” . "Illegal miners, loggers and landowners are within indigenous lands, facing members of different villages and giving money to some of their chiefs to cause them to fight among themselves," he says.
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The words of Father Amaro find their counterpoint in the president of the Rural Producers Union of Anapu, a municipality hit hard by the illegal timber industry. The rural entrepreneur claims to defend the sustained exploitation of the so-called lung of the world, although he clarifies: “The Amazon has areas that must be untouchable. Now, we need to exploit others, because the Amazon is very rich in various aspects: in fertile lands, it has many minerals and many other things to discover. ”
Fernandes' speech coincides with that of the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, who since he came to power on January 1 has defended a revision of the environmental doctrine agreed by his predecessors, anchored in a high level of shielding of the environmental areas protected and indigenous lands.
“We need this jungle to survive. We live from what's here, this is our house. Our fight with the whites comes from there: we want to prevent everything from being deforested, ”explains Turú Arara, the chief of the small Arado village, on the edge of the Transamazonian highway, where four Arara families live together in a demarcated territory.
Wood and gold illegally removed from the jungle and large livestock areas on restricted land continues to gain a highly lucrative business in this area of the Amazon. All at the expense of the future of a priceless biome for Brazil and for the planet. And of the indigenous peoples who give a desperate cry to not succumb.