“Violence and death threats against the guardians have been happening for years,” Sarah Shenker, a researcher with Survival International who knew Paulo Paulino, said

“There is a lot of impunity. The authorities are unwilling to protect the indigenous lands,” Shenker charged.

“Their racist words and genocidal, anti-indigenous proposals give a kind of green light.”

Greenpeace said the two men were “the most recent victims of a state that refuses to comply with what the constitution determines.”