Voice from the Frontline: Brazil’s Antifa Firefighters
As record-breaking
wildfires rage in the rainforest a member of the newly-formed
Autonomous Brigade writes for Freedom about its defence of affected
people, animals and the environment.Brazil has always suffered from the fires, unfortunately, but what
made Brazilian anarchists organise was the emergency situation that is
in the biomes of the Pantanal
and the Amazon rainforest. In the current government of Jair Bolsonaro,
through the Minister of the Environment Ricardo Salles, the numbers of
fires and deforestation have increased a lot. Salles himself said that
he would let the fires happen with minimal government intervention, and
this is what is happening. The government does not fine the large
landowners who are primarily responsible for the fires, in fact it does
just the opposite, it gives incentives to these landowners, and on top
of that the government places blame for the fires on native Americans
and NGOs.So realising this, and that the government is doing very little about
it, Brazilian anarchists have organised themselves into fire brigades.
The Autonomous Brigade and the Lucas Eduardo Martins
Antifascist Brigade were created. Each brigade has more than 10
volunteers from different states of Brazil, and a little over a month
ago these volunteer brigadiers, many already experienced in working with
fires and rescuing animals, went to the state that is suffering the
most from the fires, Mato Grosso.
At first the brigades went to participate in missions in the region
called Chapada dos Guimarães, where there is a great biodiversity of
birds, mammals and plants that are only found in that region. It was a
little more than a job, with a deployment of around two weeks, after
which the Autonomous Brigade went to another region, a region closer to
the border with Bolivia, where the main ecological park of Mato Grosso
lies, in the Poconé region. There they mainly focused on animal rescue,
rescuing a lot of animals affected by these fire situations. The Lucas
Eduardo Martins Anti-Fascist Brigade meanwhile went to help quilombola communities and indigenous communities.After a while other comrades arrived in Mato Grosso to help in the fight, also helping some indigenous communities in the Xingu
indigenous territory, and as all our financial support is from the
people in general and from the brigadiers themselves, the situation has
been very difficult sometimes, both in the matter of supplies and
physically.Many comrades have already returned to their homes, but we still have
some in Mato Grosso, I would also like to denounce boycotts suffered by
voluntary brigadiers by government institutions such as the fire
department, which delayed and hindered many of our actions on purpose,
in the same way that the police serve the state.The autonomous brigade will not stop just here, we understand that
the struggle for nature, the struggle for the people and animals is a
principle of anarchism, and we will continue to help fight the fires
that arise and rescue animals and people in the event of disasters and
the general education of the fire prevention community, in addition to
taking on all this an propaganda of anarchism.If you are able to, please make a donation via Paypal: [email protected]
~ Autonomous Brigade [FB]
Voice from the Frontline: Brazil’s Antifa FirefightersAs…
SOURCE: antifainternational.tumblr.com
