By Lais Morais
BRASILIA (Reuters) -Brazil should not explore oil reserves in the Amazon region, because of the dangerous impact on local communities, Indigenous leader Raoni Metuktire, of the Kayapo people, told Reuters during the country’s largest Indigenous gathering last week.
Raoni’s comments at the gathering, called Acampamento Terra Livre, come as debate heats up around Brazil’s state-run oil firm Petrobras’ bid to drill for oil off the coast of the Amazonian state of Amapa, in the sensitive Foz do Amazonas basin.
“I’m against this oil project,” said Raoni, days after he met with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. “I personally told President Lula that I am against it, I do not accept this oil in the Amazon.”
Though Lula has sought to be recognized as a champion of the world’s tropical forests and Brazil’s Indigenous peoples, he has also said that the country should be able to drill in the environmentally sensitive Foz do Amazonas basin. He has criticized the country’s environmental agency Ibama for its delay in giving Petrobras a license to do so.
Raoni, who has been an internationally recognized environmental campaigner for decades, was one of the few people invited by Lula to stand by him when he was sworn in for his third term as president in January 2023.
In May 2023, Ibama denied Petrobras’ request for an offshore drilling license for Foz do Amazonas, citing environmental concerns. It later also highlighted concerns over the effects the drilling could have on Amapa’s Indigenous communities. The oil company appealed, but a final Ibama decision is pending.
The Foz do Amazonas basin is in Brazil’s Equatorial Margin, considered the country’s most promising oil frontier, sharing geology with nearby Guyana, where Exxon Mobil is developing huge oil fields.
(Reporting by Lais Morais in Brasilia, writing by Fabio Teixeira, editing by Manuela Andreoni and Aurora Ellis)
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