'Unacceptable hardship' suffered by the Yanomami is too great to have been improvised, says Minister Gilmar Mendes.
"Determining who is responsible is urgent," stated the Supreme Court Justice regarding the humanitarian crisis caused by the Bolsonaro government.
247 - Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Gilmar Mendes demanded punishment for those responsible for the humanitarian crisis affecting the Yanomami indigenous people. In a criticism of Jair Bolsonaro's government, Mendes implied that the indigenous people were intentionally subjected to malnutrition, violence, and illegal mining.
"The unacceptable situation of destitution faced by the Yanomami people, now revealed, is too great a tragedy for us to believe it was improvised. An investigation to determine responsibility is urgent," stated the Supreme Court Justice.
The suffering of the Yanomami people, with deaths and illnesses, mostly children, came to light this Saturday after President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva visited the Indigenous Health Center (Casai) in the rural area of Boa Vista, Roraima. "What I saw in Roraima was genocide," Lula said on Twitter.
According to the Ministry of Health, in the last four years 570 Yanomami children have died of hunger or as a result of mercury contamination due to illegal mining. And more than five thousand are malnourished or starving. The situation is considered serious and the ministry has declared a "Public Health Emergency of National Importance due to lack of assistance to the Yanomami population".
This Sunday, PT (Workers' Party) parliamentarians in the Chamber of Deputies filed a criminal complaint with the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office against Jair Bolsonaro, the former Minister of Women, Family and Human Rights, Damares Alves, as well as all former presidents of the National Indian Foundation (Funai), for what they describe as the genocide of the Yanomami Indigenous Peoples in the state of Roraima (RR).
"The responsibility for this tragedy is known in Brazil and around the world. In fact, in addition to willful negligence, Bolsonaro is directly responsible for authorizing, encouraging, and protecting illegal mining on Yanomami indigenous lands and in various regions of the Amazon," the parliamentarians denounced.
According to the deputies, the state policy adopted by Jair Bolsonaro and members of his government contributed to the tragedy. “This state policy, directly commanded by the former head of state and executed, also through willful action and/or omission, by Damares Alves and other actors who were part of the misgovernment that ended on December 31, 2022, decisively contributed to the contamination of the rivers (mercury) and, consequently, resulted in impacts on the food supply (fishing) and sanitary conditions (health) of the traditional peoples who live and survive in areas where there should be no mining, legal or illegal.”
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