At COP30 in Belem, in Brazil’s Amazon region, the country’s Minister of Indigenous Peoples, Sonia Guajajara, hopes Indigenous peoples will play a leading role in the international climate conference that begins Monday.

Without them, “there is no future for humanity,” she told AFP in an interview.

Guajajara, a member of the Guajajara-Tenetehara ethnic group who was born in an Indigenous reserve in Maranhao state, is the first person to hold the portfolio created by leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva when he returned to power in 2023.

On the eve of the UN climate conference, Guajajara, 51, anticipates “the best COP in terms of Indigenous participation,” but denounces the “racism” suffered by Indigenous peoples.

She laments that Brazil’s government has not been able to approve mo

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