National Security Force called in to quash Amazon land conflict

The Federal Prosecution Service has asked the Ministry of Justice to send the National Security Force to the Mata Preta Amazon region in Anapu, Pará state, as requested by Deborah Duprat, Federal Prosecutor for Citizen's Rights.

The move is designed to contain rural conflict in the region. According to reports filed with the Rural Ombudsman's Office, armed men are evicting families that have been occupying the Bacajá Federal Public Land.

According to peasant reports, tension mounted as a man claiming to be the owner of the land sold the parcels out to two other people who are trying to expel the peasants without a court-issued order.

Eleven years ago, US missionary Dorothy Stang was murdered over land disputes in the same region.

Permanent security

On Wednesday, the National Rural Ombudsman, Gercino José da Silva Filho, and Federal Prosecutor Felício Pontes attended a meeting at the National Institute for Colonization and Agrarian Reform (INCRA) to discuss the tensions in the Anapu region. They were planning to call on the Pará State Public Security Secretariat to deploy police troops there to provide permanent security to contain the conflict.

On Tuesday evening (Jul. 26), Ombudsman Silva Filho was on his way to Mata Preta when he met people who had been evicted from the place. They asked the Rural Patrol and the Ombudsman not to show up there until a police force could be deployed on a permanent basis, to avoid retaliation against the families who were still on the land. The peasants say threats and hostilities escalated after an inspection visit from the Rural Ombudsman's Office last week.

According to Prosecutor Pontes, the case will require the presence of the nearest special police unit for rural conflict in Marabá because the threats allegedly come from gunmen hired by a rancher against the peasants.

“This should avoid our stepping in only after someone is killed as has happened before,” the prosecutor said.

Translated by Mayra Borges