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The resident Tomas Anez Dos Santos worked in a modest glade deep in the of Peru jungle when he heard movements drawing near through the lush woodland.

He realized that he stood surrounded, and halted.

“One stood, directing using an bow and arrow,” he remembers. “Unexpectedly he became aware of my presence and I started to escape.”

He had come confronting the Mashco Piro. Over many years, Tomas—who lives in the small settlement of Nueva Oceania—served as practically a neighbor to these wandering individuals, who reject engagement with foreigners.

An updated report from a human rights organization states exist no fewer than 196 termed “uncontacted groups” remaining globally. This tribe is believed to be the most numerous. The report claims a significant portion of these communities may be decimated within ten years if governments fail to take more actions to defend them.

It claims the most significant threats come from timber harvesting, digging or drilling for oil. Uncontacted groups are exceptionally at risk to ordinary disease—as such, it says a threat is presented by interaction with religious missionaries and digital content creators in pursuit of attention.

In recent times, Mashco Piro people have been coming to Nueva Oceania increasingly, according to locals.

This settlement is a fishermen's hamlet of a handful of households, located high on the banks of the local river in the heart of the Peruvian Amazon, a ten-hour journey from the closest settlement by canoe.

The territory is not designated as a safeguarded zone for remote communities, and timber firms function here.

According to Tomas that, sometimes, the sound of industrial tools can be detected day and night, and the community are witnessing their jungle disrupted and destroyed.

In Nueva Oceania, residents report they are torn. They fear the projectiles but they also have profound regard for their “brothers” residing in the forest and want to protect them.

“Allow them to live in their own way, we must not modify their traditions. For this reason we maintain our distance,” explains Tomas.

Residents in Nueva Oceania are concerned about the harm to the tribe's survival, the risk of aggression and the chance that loggers might subject the Mashco Piro to sicknesses they have no defense to.

While we were in the community, the Mashco Piro made themselves known again. A young mother, a woman with a toddler girl, was in the jungle collecting produce when she detected them.

“We detected calls, shouts from others, a large number of them. As though there were a crowd shouting,” she told us.

That was the first time she had met the Mashco Piro and she fled. An hour later, her mind was persistently pounding from terror.

“Since exist loggers and operations cutting down the jungle they're running away, maybe out of fear and they end up near us,” she said. “We don't know how they might react towards us. This is what frightens me.”

Recently, two individuals were attacked by the tribe while fishing. One was hit by an projectile to the gut. He recovered, but the other man was found dead days later with multiple puncture marks in his physique.

Authorities in Peru maintains a approach of avoiding interaction with secluded communities, making it prohibited to initiate interactions with them.

The strategy originated in a nearby nation following many years of lobbying by community representatives, who observed that early exposure with secluded communities could lead to whole populations being wiped out by illness, poverty and malnutrition.

In the 1980s, when the Nahau people in Peru came into contact with the broader society, 50% of their people succumbed within a few years. In the 1990s, the Muruhanua community suffered the same fate.

“Remote tribes are extremely vulnerable—epidemiologically, any contact may introduce diseases, and even the simplest ones might decimate them,” says Issrail Aquisse from a Peruvian indigenous rights group. “Culturally too, any exposure or interference may be extremely detrimental to their existence and health as a group.”

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