Amazon Tribe Releases Hostages After Two-Day Detention
7/17/99
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Title: Amazon Tribe Releases Hostages After Two-Day Detention
Source: The Associated Press
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: July 17, 1999
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - Two tourists and a guide were released
Saturday after being held for two days by an Amazon tribe angry over
constant encroachments into its territory, a news agency reported.
Businessman Luiz Antonio Scarparo, his wife Irene and an unidentified
guide were detained Thursday by members of the Kayapo Tribe as they
were filming a waterfall near the Para state settlement of Sao Felix
do Xingu, located some 1,700 miles north of Rio, O Estado news agency
reported Saturday.
Kayapo chiefs Raoni and Megaron said they detained the tourists after
the National Indian Foundation ignored their complaints about illegal
entries.
``Nobody can tell the Kayapos that what we are doing doesn't make
sense,'' Chief Raoni told reporters Friday.
Government officials were unavailable for comment Saturday.
The Kayapos, who live, fish and hunt in relatively primitive
conditions, have long complained about illegal entry onto their lands
by loggers, miners and farmers. Most Kayapos and some 17 other
indigenous tribes live in the 10,000-square mile area called Xingu
National Park, in the neighboring state of Mato Grosso.
Anthropologists have expressed fears about the Indians' continued
survival, as hundreds of thousands of non-Indian homesteaders and
prospectors stream into the Amazon annually, ignoring the
demarcations of native tribal areas.