🔗 Share this article

Tomas Anez Dos Santos worked in a small clearing far in the Peruvian Amazon when he heard movements coming closer through the dense jungle.

He realized that he stood hemmed in, and halted.

“One person was standing, directing using an bow and arrow,” he states. “Unexpectedly he detected of my presence and I started to run.”

He had come encountering the Mashco Piro. For decades, Tomas—residing in the small village of Nueva Oceania—had been virtually a neighbor to these nomadic individuals, who avoid interaction with outsiders.

An updated report issued by a rights organisation indicates remain at least 196 termed “uncontacted groups” left in the world. The group is thought to be the largest. The study says half of these groups could be decimated within ten years if governments fail to take more measures to safeguard them.

It argues the greatest threats are from timber harvesting, extraction or exploration for oil. Uncontacted groups are extremely susceptible to common illness—consequently, the report states a threat is caused by interaction with evangelical missionaries and digital content creators seeking attention.

Recently, Mashco Piro people have been appearing to Nueva Oceania more and more, based on accounts from residents.

Nueva Oceania is a fishermen's community of several households, located elevated on the banks of the Tauhamanu waterway deep within the Peruvian jungle, half a day from the nearest town by boat.

This region is not designated as a preserved zone for isolated tribes, and timber firms operate here.

Tomas reports that, sometimes, the sound of logging machinery can be heard around the clock, and the Mashco Piro people are witnessing their woodland disturbed and ruined.

Among the locals, people state they are torn. They dread the tribal weapons but they hold strong respect for their “brothers” residing in the woodland and wish to safeguard them.

“Let them live according to their traditions, we are unable to modify their traditions. This is why we preserve our distance,” says Tomas.

Inhabitants in Nueva Oceania are anxious about the harm to the tribe's survival, the risk of aggression and the chance that loggers might introduce the tribe to illnesses they have no resistance to.

During a visit in the community, the group made themselves known again. Letitia, a resident with a toddler child, was in the forest gathering produce when she heard them.

“We detected calls, shouts from individuals, numerous of them. As though there were a whole group yelling,” she informed us.

This marked the first instance she had come across the Mashco Piro and she fled. An hour later, her head was continually throbbing from anxiety.

“Because there are timber workers and companies destroying the forest they are fleeing, perhaps due to terror and they arrive near us,” she explained. “We are uncertain how they will behave towards us. That's what scares me.”

In 2022, two individuals were attacked by the group while angling. One man was wounded by an arrow to the gut. He lived, but the other man was found lifeless days later with multiple puncture marks in his frame.

Authorities in Peru has a approach of avoiding interaction with secluded communities, making it illegal to start encounters with them.

This approach began in the neighboring country after decades of advocacy by indigenous rights groups, who saw that first interaction with remote tribes resulted to entire groups being decimated by disease, poverty and starvation.

Back in the eighties, when the Nahau tribe in the country made initial contact with the world outside, half of their community succumbed within a few years. A decade later, the Muruhanua people experienced the identical outcome.

“Isolated indigenous peoples are highly susceptible—in terms of health, any interaction might introduce sicknesses, and even the simplest ones could decimate them,” says Issrail Aquisse from a Peruvian indigenous rights group. “Culturally too, any exposure or interference could be highly damaging to their life and health as a community.”

For the neighbours of {