{"id":18227,"date":"2019-11-26T02:19:17","date_gmt":"2019-11-26T07:19:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=18227"},"modified":"2020-01-04T15:48:22","modified_gmt":"2020-01-04T20:48:22","slug":"catholic-church-denounces-attacks-on-amazon-people-and-forest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=18227","title":{"rendered":"Catholic church denounces \u2018attacks\u2019 on Amazon people and forest"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

. . SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT . .<\/p>\n

An article by\u00a0Chlo\u00e9 Farand from Climate Change News<\/a><\/p>\n

The Catholic church in the Amazon has denounced attacks on the environment and the life of indigenous people\u00a0\u2014\u00a0setting out on a collision course with Brazil\u2019s president Jair Bolsonaro.<\/p>\n

Catholic bishops from the Amazon region committed to a more active role in the world\u2019s most important forest following three weeks of discussions at the first Amazon synod in Rome.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nPope Francis with indigenous representatives in Rome for the first Amazon synod. (Photo:\u00a0Amazon Synod of Bishops)<\/center><\/p>\n

In\u00a0a statement\u00a0<\/a> concluding the synod on Saturday, they called on countries to stop considering the forest as \u201can inexhaustible pantry\u201d and to end large scale extractive activities such as mining and forest extraction, large infrastructure projects and the promotion of monoculture and extensive livestock farming.<\/p>\n

Bishops agreed that \u201cone of the main causes of destruction in the Amazon is predatory extractivism that responds to the logic of greed,\u201d which they said had been \u201cat the root of conflicts\u201d in the region.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn this way,\u201d the statement said, \u201cthe church undertakes to be an ally of the Amazonian people to denounce the attacks on the life of the indigenous communities, the projects that affect the environment, the lack of demarcation of their territories, as well as the economic model of predatory and ecocidal development.\u201d<\/p>\n

The synod, which was called by Pope Francis in 2017, was the result of a two-year consultation process by the Catholic church across the Amazon basin, asking more than 80,000 people how the church should engage in the region.<\/p>\n

Bishops agreed the need for an alternative development plan for the Amazon, focused on indigenous rights and environmental protection \u2013 in stark opposition to Brazilian president Bolsonaro\u2019s own plan for the forest.<\/p>\n

The Amazon basin is located across nine countries but about 60% of the forest cover is contained within Brazil\u2019s borders, the country with the largest Catholic population in the world.<\/p>\n

Bolsonaro was elected on a campaign pledge to open-up the Amazon for mining and developments. Although land disputes across the Amazon\u00a0are not new, his rhetoric against indigenous people has\u00a0<\/a>emboldened land-grabbers, loggers and miners to encroach indigenous territories<\/a>, leading to\u00a0violence and murders<\/a>.<\/p>\n

(Article continued in right column)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Question for this article<\/em><\/strong><\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
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Indigenous peoples, Are they the true guardians of nature?<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

(Article continued from left column)<\/p>\n

A\u00a0spike in deforestation\u00a0<\/a> and the degradation of the world\u2019s largest tropical rainforest has also sparked serious concerns the Amazon is\u00a0releasing more carbon than it is absorbing<\/a>. Indigenous communities have been widely recognised as the most effective guardians against the destruction of the forest [See Brazil\u2019s indigenous tribes protest Bolsonaro assimilation plan<\/a>].<\/p>\n

Under the\u00a0UN declaration on the rights of indigenous people<\/a>, indigenous communities have a right to \u201cown, use, develop and control\u201d their lands and states must \u201cgive legal recognition and protection to these lands\u201d.<\/p>\n

Across the Amazon region, these rights have come under growing pressure from farming and extracting industries, something the synod described as \u201cscandalous\u201d.<\/p>\n

In Brazil, the constitution entrenches indigenous land rights in law but Bolsonaro is expected to announce a\u00a0raft of draft measures\u00a0<\/a> to revise indigenous demarcations in favour of the agribusiness industry.<\/p>\n

Paulo Moutinho, a co-founder and senior scientist at the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), told Climate Home News the synod\u2019s proposals had \u201cpotential to create a conflict between the church and the Brazilian government administration\u201d but also the \u201cpotential to reach a great audience\u201d given the church\u2019s presence across the region.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the Bolsonaro administration will listen to what the church is saying, that is another story,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Under the church\u2019s plan, a development model would be established in partnership with Amazon communities and scientific institutions to support \u201csustainable economy, circular and ecological\u201d projects, such as bio-production cooperatives and sustainable forest reserves.<\/p>\n

Reverend Augusto Zampini, director of development and faith at the Vatican who was involved in the organisation of the synod, told Climate Home News the meeting was focused on concrete actions the church could take \u201cto respond to the destruction of the biological heart of the planet and its people\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no way you can respond by doing the same thing that we have been doing for ages,\u201d he said, citing the need for cross-border structures across the region. \u201cWe have to change and we want the world to change as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Proposed changes also include the ordination of married men as priests and to re-open the debate on ordaining women as deacons to address the scarcity of clergy in the region.<\/p>\n

For the church to become \u201can ally\u201d of the indigenous people also means that it has to take into account \u201ctheir own knowledge and their own wisdom,\u201d Zampini said. \u201cWe want a model that creates value for the land, for the people and for the economy.\u201d
\nWhile he acknowledged the move was in direct contradiction with Bolsonaro\u2019s policies, he insisted the church was \u201cnot against anybody nor against the right of nations to decide what they want for their countries\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cCountries have the right to develop themselves but they don\u2019t have the right to destroy their own people. There are laws in Brazil that need to be respected,\u201d he added. \u201cIf we don\u2019t save the Amazon, we won\u2019t save the planet.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

. . SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT . . An article by\u00a0Chlo\u00e9 Farand from Climate Change News The Catholic church in the Amazon has denounced attacks on the environment and the life of indigenous people\u00a0\u2014\u00a0setting out on a collision course with Brazil\u2019s president Jair Bolsonaro. Catholic bishops from the Amazon region committed to a more active role in … Continue reading Catholic church denounces \u2018attacks\u2019 on Amazon people and forest<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77,10],"tags":[20],"class_list":["post-18227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latin-america","category-sustainable","tag-latin-america"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18227\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}