Peru Tribe Makes Second Attempt At Contact

A tribe of South American Indians living in voluntary isolation near Peru's southeastern Amazon region has made a tense attempt to contact the outside world for a second time.

Some 100 members of the Mashco-Piro tribe were captured on video attempting to cross a river that borders their remote community in the Manu National Park in the state of Madre de Dios.

The video was shot by forest rangers over three days in June and shows men armed with bows and arrows and several women and children.

It is the second time the tribe has attempted contact with outsiders. In 2011 the group was spotted on the bank of a different river after more than 20 years in isolation.

Saul Puerta Pena, director for the Interethnic Association for the Development of the Peruvian Rainforest (AIDESEP), says the video is clear evidence of the existence of isolated tribes.

"Now the government doesn't have an argument to tell us that our indigenous brothers don't exist," he said.

"Their response was always that these indigenous people who choose to live in isolation didn't exist."

Mr Pena explained that a canoe containing bananas was floated across the river to the tribe due to the risks of them coming into contact with illnesses they have no defences against.

"The tribe cannot come into contact with the remote community still because any illness could kill them," he said.

Anthropologist Beatriz Huertas, who works with Peru's agency for indigenous affairs, said the Mashco-Piro are becoming increasingly less isolated.

"It is not unusual for them to appear where they did during a season of sparse rainfall when rivers are low, and they tend to be itinerant," she said.

"What's strange is that they came so close to the population of Monte Salvado."

Last October, a park ranger was lightly wounded by a blunt arrow fired by a Mashco-Piro native after getting too close to the tribe. "It was a warning," Ms Huacchillo said.

A similar incident was recorded in 2010, when a teenager was wounded by a spear.

On their website, Survival International mentioned the death late last year of Nicolas 'Shaco' Flores, a local resident who had been leaving food and gifts for a small group of Mashco-Piro natives for 20 years.