Brazil's Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Indigenous Claim

Indigenous communities in Brazil have scored a major victory, as the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in their favor in a conflict over the Xingu Indigenous Park, in the state of Mato Grosso, and the Indigenous reserves of Nambikwara and Parecis.

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Representatives of several Indigenous peoples celebrated outside the court in Brasilia when the decision was announced.

The ruling denied the state of Mato Grosso's request of financial compensation filed in 1996 against the National Indigenous Institute, or Funai.

The state of Mato Grosso complained then that the indigenous park of the Xingu — about 27,000 square kilometers — wrongfully included lands belonging to the state, while Funai argued they belonged to Indigenous communities.

The government of President Michel Temer had backed the compensation claim, along with several other moves to limit Indigenous land rights, in what critics say is an attempt to win support from the powerful landowners' lobby in the Brazilian congress. But the Supreme Court dismissed the claim.

Judge Marco Aurelio Mello stated there was enough evidence proving that all of the park lands have been traditionally occupied by Indigenous communities as well as other territories in the surrounding areas. He cited anthropological and archeological studies showing that the occupation could be dated back to at least 800 years earlier.

“Indigenous communities cannot be denied this traditional settlement,” added Judge Alexandre de Moraes. “The property never passed on to the state,” he said. “The Funai does not need to compensate the state for the use of its own lands.”

The state of Mato Grosso was ordered to pay the legal fees incurred by Funai during the legal proceedings.

One Indigenous protester outside the court, Lindomar of the the Terena people, told teleSUR that the Supreme Court was merely doing its job of upholding the constitution, "and not letting the rights of Indigenous peoples be sacrificed to the interests of the landowners' group in Congress."

However, the threat to Indigenous land rights has not gone away.

The Supreme Court decided to delay another key ruling on whether Indigenous groups can claim land they lost before the current Consititution came into force in 1988. The Temer government has also supported imposing this cut-off date for the demarcation of Indigenous territories. But Jaqueline, of the Guarani Kaiowa people, explained to teleSUR that the "only reason we haven't been on those lands (since 1988) is that they were stolen from us by whites, we were expelled from our lands."

The court also delayed any decision on a request to overturn a presidential decree introduced by President Lula in 2004, to allow the registration of ancestral lands by Quilombolas, the descendants of Afro-Brazilians who escaped from slavery to hinterland settlements known as quilombos.

According to the Pastoral Commission on Land, land conflicts have reached an unprecedented level last year with 61 killings of indigenous activists or Afro-descendants and 1,536 conflicts recorded between Indigenous communities and ranchers.

Only 31 people have been condemned out of the 112 investigations opened, for a total of 1,834 killings committed since 1985.