Brazil's Supreme Court votes to affirm Indigenous land rights in defiance of Congress

SAO PAULO, Dec 17 - A majority of Brazil's Supreme Court reaffirmed protections for Indigenous land rights on Wednesday, curbing attempts by Congress to limit the recognition of reservations in a ruling likely to stoke tensions between the top court and lawmakers.

Six of the 10 Supreme Court justices have voted to establish Indigenous land rights as entrenched clauses of Brazil's ‍constitution that ​cannot be stripped by lawmakers, said Deborah Duprat, a former federal prosecutor who worked on Indigenous rights issues for ‍decades. 

"It's an important message to Congress," she added.

Although four Supreme Court justices have not yet rendered their opinions on the issue, their votes are not enough to block the majority decision.

Although Brazil's 1988 constitution ​recognized the rights ​of Indigenous peoples to their ancestral territory, the process of demarcating those lands has dragged on for decades. Indigenous advocates say hundreds of communities still await that formal recognition, with many entangled in violent land disputes.

In recent years, resistance to Indigenous land claims has mounted from a powerful farm lobby backed by the conservative majority in Congress.

Lawmakers passed ‍a law in 2023 to limit protections for Indigenous lands that communities cannot prove they occupied when the constitution took effect. Proponents say that cutoff date protects landowners from claims they were unaware ​of when they purchased their property. 

As the Supreme Court prepared this month to rule on ⁠whether that law was constitutional, the Senate voted to amend the constitution in line with the 2023 law.  

The lower house of Brazil's Congress is also expected to pass that constitutional amendment. But some Supreme Court justices already have argued in their votes this week that this section of the constitution cannot be amended because it protects fundamental rights.

"The legislative branch may not, under any pretext, suppress or reduce rights guaranteed ​to Indigenous peoples, under penalty of violating the foundational principles of the democratic rule of law," Justice Flavio Dino wrote.

A STRUGGLE FOR LAND

The standoff in Brasilia is the latest chapter in a long-running clash between ‌the country's conservative Congress and defenders of the ample constitutional protections for traditional ​communities and ecosystems.

Indigenous groups are fighting to correct what they see as a colonial injustice that erased and undercut Native cultures. The agricultural lobby says it is defending landowners' rights to buy, sell and develop lands for commercial farms that fuel Brazil's economy.

While the Supreme Court looks set to uphold Indigenous land rights, it has also offered concessions to landowners by allowing them to keep using lands claimed by communities until the government compensates them for their losses. Those payments are likely to take years given constraints on the federal budget.

The congressional agribusiness caucus hailed the high court for accepting some of the new rules introduced by lawmakers, but vowed to keep pushing for a 1988 cutoff limiting new Indigenous reservations to "bring legal certainty ‍and predictability." 

Indigenous groups warn that offering more legal tools to challenge their land rights could increase violence against communities. Last year, 211 Indigenous people were murdered in ​Brazil, including several in land disputes, according to the Catholic Church's Missionary Council for Indigenous Peoples.

Supreme Court Justice Gilmar Mendes, who oversaw the case, also established a new deadline of 10 years for the federal government ​to conclude territorial demarcations, a process that has dragged on for almost four decades.  

Auzerina Duarte Macuxi, a lawyer for the ‌Coordination of Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon, celebrated the court ruling overriding the 1988 cutoff for land claims, but warned that the new 10-year deadline could fuel future disputes.

When time runs out, she said, "the weakest parties will be the ones to pay." REUTERS