Uncontacted peoples
[2][3][4] A majority of uncontacted peoples live in South America, particularly northern Brazil, where the Brazilian government and National Geographic estimate between 77 and 84 tribes reside.
[8] A 2009 United Nations report also classified "peoples in initial contact" as sharing the same characteristics but beginning to regularly communicate with and integrate into mainstream society.
[13][3][9] Historic exploitation and abuse at the hands of the majority group have led many governments to give uncontacted people their lands and legal protection.
Many Indigenous groups live on national forests or protected grounds, such as the Vale do Javari in Brazil[14] or North Sentinel Island in India.
In the 1960s and 1970s, Brazil's federal government attempted to assimilate and integrate native groups living in the Amazon jungle in order to use their lands for farming.
FUNAI was successful in securing protected lands which have allowed certain groups to remain relatively uncontacted until the present day.
[citation needed] A different outcome occurred in Colombia when the Nukak tribe of Indigenous people was contacted by an evangelical group.
This led to an outbreak of respiratory infections, violent clashes with illicit drug traffickers, and the death of hundreds of the Nukak, more than half of the tribe.
For example, then Peruvian President Alan García claimed in 2007 that uncontacted groups were only a "fabrication of environmentalists bent on halting oil and gas exploration".
[19] As recently as 2016, a Chinese subsidiary mining company in Bolivia ignored signs that they were encroaching on uncontacted tribes, and attempted to cover it up.
[21] It was those threats, combined with attacks on their tribe by illegal cocaine traffickers, that led a group of Acre Indians to make contact with a village in Brazil and subsequently with the federal government in 2014.
Satellite images suggest that some tribes intentionally migrate away from roads or logging operations in order to remain secluded.
[22] The Brazilian state organization FUNAI in collaboration with anthropological experts has chosen to make controlled initial contact with tribes.
[24][12] There have been reports of human safaris in India's Andaman Islands and in the Peruvian Amazon, where tourism companies attempt to help tourists see uncontacted or recently contacted peoples.
In 1987, it set up the Department of Isolated Indians inside FUNAI, facilitating the work of Sydney Possuelo and José Carlos Meirelles, and declared the Vale do Javari perpetually sealed off, encompassing an area of 85,444 square kilometres (32,990 sq mi).
Two brothers of the Piripkura tribe had continued to live alone in the jungle but initiated contact with FUNAI after a fire they had kept burning for 18 years went out.
Additionally, the government of Jair Bolsonaro signalled its intention to develop the Amazon and reduce the size of Indigenous reservations.
[35] With the creation of gigantic tribal reserves and strict patrolling, Colombia is now regarded as one of the countries that offer maximum protection to uncontacted Indigenous people.
[36] The Nukak people are nomadic hunter-gatherers living between the Guaviare and Inírida rivers in south-east Colombia at the headwaters of the northwest Amazon basin.
[43] According to Survival International, Brazilian company Yaguarete Porá S.A. is converting thousands of hectares of the Ayoreo-Totobiegosode tribe's ancestral territory into cattle ranching land.
[21] The Nomole (derogatory called Mashco-Piro) are nomadic Arawak hunter-gatherers who inhabit Manú National Park in Peru.
Other groups include the Machiguenga, Nanti, Asháninka, Mayoruna, Isconahua, Kapanawa, Yora, Murunahua, Chitonahua, Mastanahua, Kakataibo, and Pananujuri.
While it is difficult for journalists and organizations to enter West Papua, no government agency is dedicated to protecting isolated Indigenous groups.
Human rights organizations, including Survival International, have argued that there is a need to raise awareness of the existence of uncontacted tribes, for example, to prevent the development of infrastructure near their lands.
[52] Ishi, a member of the Yahi people of Northern California, remained in voluntary isolation from the outside world until 1911 and was acclaimed as the "last wild Indian".
