The government is auctioning off plots of pristine Indigenous reserves for fossil fuel projects, with campaigners warning of a ‘silent genocide’
Above the canopy of the tallest trees that vie for sunlight in the depths of the Peruvian Amazon, gas flares shoot into the sky. Below, Julio Cusurichi, 53, can see the thick, dark grease that clings to the leaves and the toxins leaking into the streams.
“Oil and gas projects are coming closer and closer. They are expanding into new lands,” says Cusurichi, a member of the Shipibo-Conibo people, a Goldman prize winner and one of Peru’s foremost Indigenous leaders. “Our territory is our life, but the government is auctioning off plots. It is a great invasion with a grave impact.”
