Surviving International has released rare photographs of the Mashco Piro, an uncontacted Indigenous community in the isolated Peruvian Amazon. The photos show dozens of the people on the banks of a river near logging firms’ concessions.
The local Indigenous rights group Fenamad reported that the elusive tribe has been seen emerging from the forests more frequently in recent weeks, seemingly distancing themselves from the increasing number of loggers.
In the past few days, more than fifty Mashco Piro people have shown up close to the Yine town of Monte Salvado. According to the NGO that works to protect Indigenous rights, another group of seventeen people showed up near the community of Puerto Nuevo.
According to Survival International, the Mashco Piro, who live in a region between two natural reserves in Madre de Dios, rarely appear and don’t interact with the Yine or anyone else very often.
Within the Mashco Piro’s lands, a number of logging firms own timber concessions.
According to Survival International, one business, Canales Tahuamanu, has constructed more than 200 km (120 miles) of roads for its logging trucks to gather timber.
A Canales Tahuamanu representative in Lima did not respond to a request for comment.
The Madre de Dios forests span 53,000 hectares (130,000 acres) and are approved by the Forest Stewardship Council for the extraction of mahogany and cedar.
On June 28, the Peruvian authorities announced that locals had seen Mashco Piro on the Las Piedras river, 150 kilometres from the Madre de Dios capital city of Puerto Maldonado.
