One thing that the team at Los Amigos did not do is peer deeper into the reserve to try to determine where the Mashco Piro are camped out. Gutiérrez says the decision on whether to establish some kind of monitoring system for isolated communities rests with governments and Indigenous groups, but few doubt that it is possible.
Some researchers worry about the implications of this kind of work. Greg Asner, an ecologist at Arizona State University in Tempe, regularly captured evidence of encampments of isolated groups more than a decade ago, when his team was surveying the Peruvian Amazon in a plane equipped with a powerful laser-based system that provides 3D images of the forest. He flagged the images to his sources at Peru’s environment ministry, but never saw the groups themselves as a legitimate research topic. Even today, he doesn’t see the value in actively tracking them.
“It’s creepy, like describing the home range of jaguars, but human rights are different than jaguar rights,” says Asner. “If we know they are in there, why do we need to know exactly where they are sleeping at night?”
Despite the ethical worries about monitoring, some Indigenous leaders are open to the idea. Knowing where isolated groups are could help surrounding Indigenous communities to prevent unintended and dangerous contact, but “it is the Indigenous organizations that should implement and execute any system of control and surveillance of the Indigenous peoples in isolation,” says Julio Cusurichi, president of FENAMAD, which has worked with the Peruvian government to prevent contact and conflict since the Mashco Piro began to emerge.
FENAMAD was also instrumental in pushing for the creation of the Madre de Dios reserve in 2002. Twenty years later, however, the reserve’s borders have yet to be finalized, and the Indigenous organization is still pushing to expand the eastern boundary to cover areas where the Mashco Piro are known to roam. The problem is that these same areas are currently occupied by logging concessions, which would be costly for the government to cancel.
Julio Cusurichi, president of the Native Federation of the Madre de Dios River and Tributaries (FENAMAD).
Julio Cusurichi, president of the Native Federation of the Madre de Dios River and Tributaries (FENAMAD).
For Cusurichi, the killing of the logger in August is yet another reminder of the precarious situation along the border of the reserve and the risks to both outsiders and the Mashco Piro. Too often, he contends, the government is more concerned with protecting economic interests than the rights of isolated peoples.
Tauli-Corpuz, the former UN rapporteur, has little doubt that scientists mean well, but she worries about any efforts to document the precise location of isolated groups. “If this information falls into the wrong hands, these people will be disturbed in ways they could never imagine,” she says.
Officials from the culture ministry acknowledged these dangers in discussions with Nature, and said they were looking at potential regulations to control the flow of information and restrict who can peer into the reserves.
Although Forsyth says the ministry is full of people who want to do the right thing, he is wary of assuming that government officials always mean well. In Brazil, critics have accused President Bolsonaro, a right-wing populist, of sidelining scientists at FUNAI and attempting to appoint a former Christian missionary to head the division that handles isolated peoples. In the Madre de Dios region, the former governor, Luis Hidalgo Okimura, disappeared in February just before he was to be jailed in connection with an investigation into an illegal logging ring.
“In some cases, the government may not be trustworthy,” Forsyth warns. He places more faith in Indigenous organizations and their advocates. “Giving them access to whatever information they would like or can’t generate themselves ought to be the priority.”
