"‘The Earth is crying out for help’: as fires decimate South America, smoke shrouds its skies"
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Since the start of September, over 180,000 hectares ( 444,789 acres) of dry forest and savannah have gone up in smoke around Cerro Chovoreca, a protected reserve near the border with Bolivia. The blaze began on recently deforested ranchland before racing out of control. Videos on social media showed firefighters running from advancing walls of flame. The conflagration has ravaged areas used by Ayoreo nomads – South America’s only uncontacted people outside the Amazon – to hunt and forage.
“Our isolated brothers live in that territory,” said Choyoide José Fernando Jurumi, the leader of the local Ayoreo Chovoreca community. “It causes us great pain. What are they going to eat? Where are they going to hide?”
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Peru’s prime minister, Gustavo Adrianzén, caused anger by attributing the fires to traditional slash-and-burn practices, though experts say most were likely deliberately set to open up land for farming, ranching and illicit crops like coca, the plant used to make cocaine. “Most of the fires were started to open the doors to illegal activity,” said Constantino Aucca, who leads Acción Andina, a community-led reforestation model in Andean countries.
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This is a settler-colonial ecocide and genocide wave just like centuries ago, but with industrial tech. We're watching it in real time, it's not in ye old history. There's no 'critical history' controversy, no ambiguous foggy past, it's the smoking present, registered in PM2.5, PM10 and GDP.
The smoke is from the fire burials of forest ecosystems and indigenous homes.
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/oct/02/south-america-wildfire-smoke-deforestation-drought
#Amazon #AmazonRainForest #fire #arson #settlerColonialism #terraNullius #ecocide #genocide #capitalism #climate #carbonSink #tippingPoint #goVegan