Brazil’s new President Jair Bolsonaro rolls back Indigenous tribe protections

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Funai, the department established in 1967 to protect the rights of Brazil’s Indigenous people, has been effectively broken up, with one of its biggest responsibilities — to identify and draw boundaries of Indigenous land across the country — handed over to the Ministry of Agriculture. The rest of Funai will be transferred to the Ministry of Human Rights, which is led by evangelical pastor Damares Alves. Critics of the change have described it as a “catastrophe” for Brazil’s 900,000 Indigenous people, who could face total annihilation. Read more…