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A man named Tomas Anez Dos Santos toiled in a modest glade far in the Peruvian Amazon when he heard footsteps approaching through the thick woodland.

He realized that he had been encircled, and stood still.

“One person was standing, directing with an arrow,” he remembers. “Unexpectedly he noticed of my presence and I began to run.”

He had come confronting the Mashco Piro tribe. For a long time, Tomas—dwelling in the modest community of Nueva Oceania—had been practically a local to these nomadic tribe, who reject interaction with outsiders.

An updated report issued by a advocacy organisation indicates remain no fewer than 196 termed “uncontacted groups” left globally. This tribe is considered to be the biggest. The report says half of these groups might be wiped out within ten years should administrations neglect to implement additional measures to safeguard them.

It claims the most significant risks come from deforestation, digging or drilling for petroleum. Isolated tribes are exceptionally susceptible to basic sickness—consequently, the report notes a danger is presented by contact with proselytizers and social media influencers seeking clicks.

In recent times, Mashco Piro people have been venturing to Nueva Oceania more and more, as reported by inhabitants.

This settlement is a fishing hamlet of several clans, located atop on the edges of the Tauhamanu waterway deep within the Peruvian rainforest, half a day from the closest settlement by boat.

The area is not classified as a protected area for remote communities, and deforestation operations function here.

Tomas reports that, at times, the sound of heavy equipment can be detected continuously, and the tribe members are seeing their jungle disturbed and destroyed.

Within the village, people state they are torn. They dread the Mashco Piro's arrows but they also have strong respect for their “brothers” dwelling in the forest and want to protect them.

“Allow them to live as they live, we can't modify their culture. That's why we preserve our separation,” explains Tomas.

Inhabitants in Nueva Oceania are concerned about the damage to the community's way of life, the risk of aggression and the possibility that timber workers might introduce the community to illnesses they have no immunity to.

At the time in the village, the group made themselves known again. Letitia Rodriguez Lopez, a woman with a young child, was in the forest picking food when she heard them.

“We detected calls, cries from individuals, a large number of them. Like there were a whole group yelling,” she told us.

It was the first instance she had come across the tribe and she fled. After sixty minutes, her thoughts was continually pounding from terror.

“Because operate timber workers and companies clearing the jungle they are escaping, perhaps out of fear and they arrive near us,” she explained. “We are uncertain what their response may be with us. That's what scares me.”

Two years ago, a pair of timber workers were attacked by the group while catching fish. A single person was struck by an arrow to the gut. He lived, but the other person was found dead subsequently with nine arrow wounds in his body.

Authorities in Peru maintains a strategy of avoiding interaction with remote tribes, establishing it as prohibited to commence encounters with them.

The strategy originated in Brazil following many years of advocacy by community representatives, who noted that first interaction with secluded communities resulted to entire groups being eliminated by disease, destitution and starvation.

In the 1980s, when the Nahau people in Peru made initial contact with the world outside, 50% of their community died within a few years. A decade later, the Muruhanua tribe experienced the similar destiny.

“Remote tribes are extremely at risk—epidemiologically, any contact could introduce sicknesses, and even the simplest ones may decimate them,” explains an advocate from a tribal support group. “Culturally too, any exposure or intrusion can be very harmful to their existence and health as a community.”

For local residents of {