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Brazil Snags 17 in Raid on Illegal Logging |
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| BRAZIL: September 17, 2003 | ||
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BRASILIA, Brazil - Brazilian authorities yesterday arrested 17 people who they said illegally cut down 10,000 hectares of virgin tropical timber, in what could be the biggest such clampdown.
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The men were arrested in one of the Amazon jungle's most deforested states, Rondonia, after a two-month investigation, according to Brazil's government environmental agency, Ibama. Officials said the gang used permits illegally issued by five Ibama employees to transport timber from the protected forests. Logging in the Amazon is controlled by strict environmental licensing, which allows timber to be harvested in designated areas. Ibama said the suspects cut down trees in official forest reserves, where logging is banned. "I think this must be the biggest arrest of a gang of illegal loggers in Brazil, most certainly in the state of Rondonia," Ibama's manager in Rondonia, Osvaldo Pitaluga, told Reuters. Pitaluga said there was evidence the Ibama officials were part of the gang, which had operated for several years. "They colluded with Ibama, putting the timber on the market," he said. The Ibama officials facilitated the loggers' operations by issuing licenses, he said. Environmentalists say much of the illegal logging in the Amazon - the world's largest tropical jungle - is spurred by corruption at the underfunded Ibama agency, which is charged with monitoring deforestation in Brazil's tropical forests. Together with fires by farmers, illegal logging is the biggest cause of the Amazon's deforestation, which last year jumped by 40 percent to 9,840 square miles. The men will be held in custody until trial. If convicted, they could spend several years behind bars and face up to $1 million in fines.
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REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
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