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The resident Tomas Anez Dos Santos was laboring in a modest clearing within in the Peruvian rainforest when he heard footsteps drawing near through the thick jungle.

It dawned on him that he had been hemmed in, and stood still.

“One was standing, pointing using an bow and arrow,” he recalls. “Somehow he detected of my presence and I started to escape.”

He ended up confronting members of the Mashco Piro. Over many years, Tomas—who lives in the tiny settlement of Nueva Oceania—was almost a neighbor to these itinerant individuals, who shun interaction with foreigners.

An updated study by a rights organisation states there are at least 196 described as “isolated tribes” remaining worldwide. The group is thought to be the most numerous. It claims a significant portion of these tribes might be decimated within ten years if governments fail to take further actions to defend them.

The report asserts the greatest risks stem from logging, digging or drilling for crude. Remote communities are exceptionally susceptible to basic disease—therefore, the report notes a threat is caused by exposure with evangelical missionaries and digital content creators in pursuit of attention.

Recently, Mashco Piro people have been venturing to Nueva Oceania more and more, based on accounts from inhabitants.

The village is a fishermen's village of seven or eight clans, located atop on the banks of the Tauhamanu waterway in the center of the of Peru jungle, 10 hours from the most accessible town by boat.

The territory is not classified as a protected zone for remote communities, and logging companies work here.

According to Tomas that, on occasion, the racket of heavy equipment can be noticed around the clock, and the tribe members are seeing their woodland disturbed and devastated.

In Nueva Oceania, people say they are conflicted. They dread the tribal weapons but they also possess deep admiration for their “kin” residing in the forest and desire to protect them.

“Allow them to live in their own way, we can't change their traditions. That's why we preserve our distance,” states Tomas.

The people in Nueva Oceania are worried about the harm to the community's way of life, the risk of aggression and the possibility that loggers might subject the tribe to sicknesses they have no immunity to.

While we were in the community, the Mashco Piro appeared again. Letitia, a young mother with a young child, was in the jungle collecting fruit when she noticed them.

“There were calls, shouts from people, many of them. As if it was a whole group calling out,” she informed us.

This marked the first time she had come across the group and she fled. After sixty minutes, her head was continually racing from terror.

“Since there are timber workers and companies clearing the woodland they are escaping, maybe out of fear and they end up near us,” she said. “We don't know how they might react towards us. That is the thing that terrifies me.”

In 2022, two individuals were assaulted by the group while angling. One man was wounded by an bow to the stomach. He survived, but the second individual was located lifeless days later with multiple puncture marks in his physique.

The Peruvian government follows a approach of non-contact with isolated people, establishing it as illegal to initiate contact with them.

The strategy was first adopted in the neighboring country following many years of campaigning by indigenous rights groups, who saw that first contact with isolated people lead to entire communities being wiped out by disease, hardship and starvation.

Back in the eighties, when the Nahau community in the country first encountered with the outside world, half of their people succumbed within a short period. During the 1990s, the Muruhanua tribe experienced the similar destiny.

“Remote tribes are highly susceptible—in terms of health, any exposure could transmit sicknesses, and including the most common illnesses may decimate them,” explains a representative from a local advocacy organization. “In cultural terms, any contact or disruption may be very harmful to their existence and survival as a group.”

For local residents of {