The recent killing comes on the heels of a government probe into an alleged massacre of natives in Yasuní.
On February 6 native groups reported that witnesses in the area had said that between 5 and 15 Taromenani and Tagaeri tribesmen had been killed, possibly beheaded, by illegal loggers when the tribal members raided a logging camp.
A team of Ecuadorian police, soldiers, and officials from the Ministry of the Environment were dispatched to the zone to investigate but said it came up empty-handed.
"No evidence was found of the incident in question," according to the government's official report, provided to National Geographic News by the environment ministry.
The report states that locals found four abandoned tribal spears, but no bodies or other signs of violence were found.
Some native leaders were incredulous of the official account.
"I do not believe the government report," said Enqueri Nihua Ehuenguime, president of the Huaorani Nationality Organization of Ecuador. The Huaorani is another tribe that lives within the park.
"If I had the resources I could prove the deaths," Nihua said.
The government report does document several signs of illegal logging activity in the area, including stacks of illicitly cut cedar and the remains of a camp.
The document suggests that the government build a permanent military police post on the nearby River Shiripuno, a common entry point for illegal loggers into the region.
It also recommends taking "pertinent legal actions against traffickers of wood that have been identified."
Ecuadorian officials have since taken steps to build a permanent post on the river.
"I can report now that we have finally, after overcoming many obstacles, established a permanent control post in the entrance point to the Taromenane-Tagaeri territory in Yasuní National Park," said Falconi, the Ecuadorian police advisor.
"We hope that with this action, further incursions by illegal loggers will be stopped, [along with] the risk to the life and well-being of people in voluntary isolation in that region."
Money to Stop Drilling?
Numerous rights groups have pushed for such protections in recent months, and some activists met the news with cautious optimism.
"The Taromenane and Tagaeri are so isolated that they have vulnerable immune systems and are in danger of coming into contact with outsiders," said Matt Finer, a biologist with the U.S.-based group Save America's Forests.
(Read related story: "Oil Exploration in Amazon Threatens 'Unseen' Tribes" [March 21, 2008].)
"We are pleased that the government finally seems committed to stopping loggers. Setting up the control post on the Shiripuno River was a major first step in cracking down on the illegal logging, since that was the loggers' primary entry and exit point."
Still, others say new threats loom.
The Ecuadorian government is threatening to open parts of Yasuní to oil bidding if the international community does not pay U.S. $350 million a year for ten years.
"Today one of the main threats to the lives of the [Indians living in isolation] is illegal wood-cutting," said Milagros Aguirre, a journalist who was written about tribal conflict in Yasuní.
"But while the oil industry so far is not in the untouchable zone, it will eventually be there."
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