Minister: Brazilian Amazon should be in the hands of Brazil

General Augusto Heleno, head of the president’s Office for Institutional Security—a position with minister status in Brazil—talked about the importance of the Amazon and the main challenges facing the area. There are institutions and NGOs, he said, in addition to international authorities, interested in interfering in the treatment given to the Brazilian Amazon. The topic, he said, concerns national “sovereignty.” “Brazil is the one to take care of the Brazilian Amazon,” he declared.

“I won’t meddle with the Colombian Amazon, they can do what they want. In the Peruvian Amazon they do what they want, as long as whatever’s done does not affect the ecological integrity of our Amazon,” the general said during the funeral of Journalist Ricardo Boechat on Tuesday (Feb. 12), in São Paulo.

Minister Augusto Heleno - José Cruz/Agência Brasil

Each country must be responsible for their sovereignty, the minister argued. “Brazil won’t voice its thoughts on the Sahara desert, the Ardennes, Alaska; each country must take care of their sovereignty.”

Synod

The minister also answered questions about the debate held at the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops for the Amazon, organized by the Catholic Church and slated to take place in October in the Vatican. The discussions will be center on the theme “The Amazon: New paths for the Church and for an integral ecology.”

“What I think we should be concerned with is not allowing foreign entities, foreign NGOs, foreign heads of state, sometimes behind these NGOs, to voice their thoughts on how the Brazilian Amazon should be treated,” Heleno said.

In his view, Brazil has appropriate sustainable policies that must be respected. “We know what we have to do. We know how to do sustainable development and curb deforestation. We are the country with the lowest deforestation rate up to the present. We keep putting up with things we didn’t have to put up with.”

Boechat

Representing President Jair Bolsonaro, who is recuperating from an intestinal surgery in hospital, Augusto Heleno attended the funeral of Ricardo Boehat, who died on Monday in São Paulo following a helicopter crash. He was an anchor and a radio announcer with Band News, where he had been working since 2004.

“[I came] to bring the message from the Brazilian people, to show that we feel the role left vacant in our journalism,” the minister said after arriving at the funeral at the Museum of Image and Sound, western São Paulo.

The minister mentioned Boechat’s “intellectual honesty.” “He had an amazing intellectual honesty. He said certain things because he had sources that supplied him with information, and then, later on, when he would learn of the accurate version, he would ratify what he had said. This is a sign of how great he was,” he said.