Amazon Catholic leaders: Isolated Indigenous peoples must be protected

The man, who lived alone in the Tanaru Indigenous Territory in the western state of Rondônia, was known as the "man of the hole," because of his practice of digging concealed pits, probably to trap game. Little is known about him or his tribe, which was decimated as loggers and cattle ranchers moved into the area in the 1980s and 1990s. He had lived alone for at least 26 years and resisted all efforts at contact, according to the Brazilian government's Indigenous affairs agency, FUNAI, which monitored him. He was found dead in his hut in late August. "Another age-old culture disappears without our knowledge, due to the genocide perpetrated by farmers and loggers," the Brazilian bishops' Indigenous Missionary Council, or CIMI, said in a statement. "He must be remembered and perpetuated as a symbol of the resistance of all peoples who, in defense of autonomy, adopt the strategy of voluntary isolation." The Amazon basin is home to more than 100 semi-nomadic Indigenous groups that shun contact with the outside world. Most live along rivers in the densely forested region along the borders between Brazil and Peru, Bolivia, Colombia and Venezuela, and along the border between Peru and Ecuador.