Human rights and environmental advocates hope that a visit to the eastern Amazon last month by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) will prompt the federal government to safeguard indigenous communities threatened by Brazil’s massive Belo Monte Dam. Three members of a 16-member IACHR delegation visiting Brazil last month traveled to a Xingu River indigenous community where residents say fish stocks are shrinking due to water diversions being carried out in connection with the US$12 billion, 11,233-megawatt dam project. On its visit to Brazil, the delegation urged authorities to address this and other problems cited by six advocacy groups as part of IACHR proceedings concerning the dam’s environmental and social impacts. The advocacy organizations highlighted the problems in an April report giving their final arguments in the case, which was opened by the IACHR in 2015 in answer to a complaint filed by the groups... [Log in to read more]