This post is part of Global Voices’ August 2026 Spotlight series, “Indigenous Rights.” This series offers insight into the lives and experiences of Indigenous peoples to build connections across regions, center Indigenous experiences, and share the stories of leaders, activists, community members, and more. You can support this coverage by donating here.

On July 12, 2025, a 21-year-old Avá Guaraní Indigenous man was found beheaded in the city of Guaíra, Paraná state, southern Brazil, near an Indigenous territory. Next to the body, there was a letter with threats to the local Indigenous communities, including setting fire to school buses with children, if they didn’t leave the land. “This is not an empty threat, but one filled with hate,” said the message. A few months prior, four Indigenous youngsters, including a seven-year-old, were hurt in another attack in the same city. The region has been marked by a decades-long conflict since the construction of the Itaipu hydroelectric dam, which displaced communities from their territories.

The 21-year-old man, Everton Lopes Rodrigues, was the son of a local cacique (Indigenous leader), Bernardo Rodrigues Diegro, who told news outlet G1 that threats are recurrent. “They say our head is worth money. We are very scared; last night, no one could sleep in our community.”

Rodrigues was one of the 258 Indigenous people murdered in 2025 in Brazil, according to the latest “Report on Violence Against Indigenous People” from Cimi, the Missionary Indigenist Council, an organization that advocates for Indigenous rights and is linked to the Episcopal Conference of Brazil (CNBB). Launched this August 13, the report shows a rise in the number of Indigenous killings in the past year, above the average registered during Jair Bolsonaro’s government. As in Rodrigues’ case, the majority of the attacks and violations were connected to conflicts about land rights.

The data gathered by Cimi also mentions an increase in suicide cases, with 34 percent of the victims being under 19 years old and 41 percent between the ages of 20 and 29, and deaths of babies and children, with 57 percent of the cases being from causes considered avoidable.

The report points out that the country registered an increase in all three types of systemic violence against Indigenous people listed by them – violence against individuals, against patrimony, and by public power omission – all amid growing political and economic pressure to put a break on land demarcation.

Less than one percent of the Brazilian population self-identifies as Indigenous, around 1.6 million out of 213 million people, according to the 2022 Census. Even though the number represents an increase compared to the previous study, and with some political advances achieved, governments still fall short of fulfilling their rights.

Boiling pressure

The 1988 Constitution, established in Brazil right after two decades under a military dictatorship, states that Indigenous peoples’ rights over lands traditionally occupied by them are original, preceding the establishment of the State itself, and recognizes them as the first inhabitants in the country, explains ISA’s page (Social Environment Institute).

Nesse sentido, a demarcação de uma Terra Indígena, fruto do reconhecimento feito pelo Estado, é ato meramente declaratório, cujo objetivo é simplesmente precisar a real extensão da posse para assegurar a plena eficácia do dispositivo constitucional. E a obrigação de proteger as Terras Indígenas cabe à União.

In that sense, the demarcation of an Indigenous Land, result of a State recognition, is a mere declaratory act, which goal is simply to determine the real extent of ownership to ensure plain efficiency of the constitutional device. And the obligation to protect Indigenous lands is up to the Union.

Still, for years now, there has been an attempt to push a new framework to set a time limit on any land claims. If approved, the so-called “Marco Temporal” (milestone thesis) could determine that Indigenous people would only be able to claim territories they were occupying up to October 5, 1988, the date of the promulgation of the Constitution. This would affect communities displaced over the years, in some cases by the hands of the State itself, who could only return and reclaim their territories after this period.

In 2023, the thesis was ruled unconstitutional by the Federal Supreme Court with nine to two votes. Yet, after the decision, the National Congress rushed to approve a bill proposing to change the Constitution to fit this framework. Later, in 2025, the Supreme Court rejected the thesis again, but kept significant excerpts of the law that could delay or even stop the demarcation of some lands, says Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples’ Articulation (APIB). This month, the Court is analyzing appeals for the ruling and regulation regarding mining on Indigenous lands.

‘Fighting for territory is not a crime’

In their note, APIB says there is an escalation of threats against Indigenous people because of the current climate:

Esse cenário representa um conflito jurídico em que há uma ofensiva coordenada que ameaça centenas de povos indígenas, amplia a insegurança e a violência contra comunidades e compromete a proteção da biodiversidade e o enfrentamento da crise climática.

This scenario represents a legal conflict that involves a coordinated offensive threatening hundreds of Indigenous peoples, amplifying insecurity and violence against communities and compromising the protection of biodiversity and the confrontation of the climate crisis.

Political pressure also comes through other ongoing proposals in Congress, such as bill 6093/2023, which could render around 98 percent of pending demarcation processes unfeasible. According to Cimi’s report, Brazil has 897 Indigenous lands still pending regularization; 582 of them haven’t even begun the demarcation process. Advances made by the federal government were important, they evaluate, but are still sparse and falling short of Indigenous peoples’ needs and demands. Cimi affirms in their report that “it is not possible to unlink violence and violations registered during 2025 from the attacks against Indigenous land rights over the year.”

The land of the community of the young Ava Guaraní Indigenous man killed in Paraná is among those pending regulation, despite having its limits recognized in 2018. The Federal Police are leading the investigation of his murder.

Cimi also highlights another aspect in this scenario:

Soma-se a este contexto a pressão econômica, que encontra ressonância nos três Poderes da República, pela regulamentação da mineração em terras indígenas, pela realização de grandes obras de infraestrutura para o escoamento de grãos e minério e pela exploração de gás e petróleo em áreas com impacto direto sobre povos indígenas.

Added to this contest is economic pressure, which resonates in the three powers of the Republic, through the regulation of mining on Indigenous lands, the execution of great infrastructural works to transport grains and ore, and the exploration of gas and oil in areas with a direct impact on Indigenous peoples.

A research study led by Apoinme, an association including Indigenous peoples from the northeastern region and the states of Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo, based on data from the National Oil Agency (ANP) and local communities, pointed out that 84 Indigenous lands could be affected by natural gas and oil enterprises, according to Alma Preta.

During the press conference for Cimi’s report, Tipuici Manoki, an Indigenous woman who lives in the Juruena River basin region, spoke about her people’s fight against such enterprises, carried out without consulting communities. This August 13, she said:

Estamos falando de vida, de direitos, é isso que o relatório traz. Quiçá a gente seria feliz se diminuísse a violência contra nós, mas vemos que ela só aumenta. Quando a gente fala sobre o relatório é de embargar a voz, porque estamos falando de vidas, de direitos, de pessoas que morreram lutando por seus territórios. Isso reflete na minha região.

We are talking about life, rights, this is what the report is about. Perhaps we would be happy if violence against us was decreasing, but it only grows. Talking about the report makes your voice choke up, because we’re talking about lives, rights, people who died fighting for their territories. All this reflects on my region.

Mongabay had reported that Tipuici Manoki’s region was previously affected by pesticide contamination and dams.