Brazil — Here at the great bend of the mighty Xingu River, the Brazilian government is pushing to construct a dam that could end up being the world's second largest, generating huge amounts of hydroelectric power.

The Council of the Yanomami and Ye'kuana Special Indigenous Health District submitted a letter on June 30 to Brazilian Ministers of Justice and Environment demanding expulsion of gold miners that have raided their Amazon reservation. The letter, signed by 30 Yanomami and Ye'kuana community representatives and advocates said, "It's not hard to foresee that we are returning to a situation of social and sanitary chaos like the one we experienced at the end of the 1980s and the early 1990s, when at least a fifth of the Yanomami population died from diseases brought by the prospectors."

In an attempt to provide easy access to impartial information about the deforestation of the Amazon, The National Institute of Space Research (INPE) has launched a new website. This site provides information based on the digital records of satellite images, including LANDSAT images and maps of the deforestation. The site allows to spatially localize areas of drastic tree loss; an aide that will permit a more comprehensive analysis of the factors behind deforestation and help develop policies to protect against further forest loss.

For the past three years, the Federation of the Indigenous Organizations of the Negro River (FOIRN) has been responsible for the health of the 20,000 Indians in its constituent region. Because of accumulated debts with medical suppliers after repeated nonpayment of bills, FOIRN has decided to cease all activities in the region. This announcement was made to Ricardo Chagas, Director of the Department of Indigenous Health, on June 2. The organization is unable to pay the salaries of its staff of over 200 people.

On June 28 a meeting was held in Quito, under the title of “International Forum: The Impacts of the Spraying of Crops, Typified as “Illicit Activity”, and the Armed Conflict. Responses of the Indigenous Amazon Peoples of the Boundaries”. Amazonian indigenous peoples from Ecuador, Colombia, Perú and Brazil met to discuss a joint proposal for defending their traditional ways of life and environment in the face of Plan Colombia. The proposal will be addressed to their respective governments and to the United States in the coming months.