On the morning of 5 June, Bruno Pereira and Dom Phillips, environmental and Indigenous peoples’ rights defenders, were disappeared in the Javari Valley, in the Brazilian Amazon. On 15 June, the Federal Police reported that one of the two people arrested on suspicion of involvement in their disappearances confessed to having murdered them, and that remains found in the forest had been forwarded to forensics. Authorities made stigmatizing statements against Bruno and Dom, issued contradictory information, and conducted a belated investigation without sufficient resources or transparency. We urge the General Prosecutor of the Republic to guarantee a prompt, thorough, impartial, and independent investigation into this case, and bring those suspected of criminal responsibility to justice.
