AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman. We’re broadcasting from the U.N. climate summit — that’s COP30 — in the Brazilian city of Belém, the gateway to the Amazon.

On Wednesday, I sat down with Brazil’s first minister of Indigenous peoples, Sônia Guajajara. Democracy Now! last spoke to her in 2023, when the UAE hosted the climate talks in Dubai. We’re now in her home country.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re here with Brazil’s first minister of Indigenous peoples, life-long leader of the Brazilian Indigenous rights movement, a member of the Guajajara community, whose traditional homeland sits in the northeast of Brazil. It was established, the minister of Indigenous peoples, under President Lula in 2023. Today, the minister, Minister Guajajara, is here in Belém, and we’re in the last days of this conference.

It’s an honor to speak to you again. Minister Guajajara, what are you hoping to get out of COP30?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] I think we got an important result. That is the biggest participation of Indigenous peoples in the whole COP history, because participation is already an important result to guarantee protagonism and advocacy. But now for the second week in this final phase, we are expecting the recognition of Indigenous territories and the demarcation of these territories as a climate policy, one of the most efficient solutions to confront the climate crisis.

AMY GOODMAN: On Friday, Indigenous people, like yourself, stopped the climate summit, saying that their rights weren’t being respected. They had a flotilla. They also just blockaded the entrance to COP30. What were your thoughts about that?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] This is why it was important that this conference happened here in Brazil, in the Amazon, after being realized and organized in three countries that did not allow democratic manifestation. And Brazil, as a democratic country, understands that this is important. Social society can and should protest.

And we were able to guarantee their participation also inside of the COP. We guaranteed the participation in the blue zone of 400 Indigenous representatives chosen by its own organization. So, the Indigenous movement, inside the COP, it is represented. But as COP is also not only the blue zone, we also have Indigenous representatives participate in all the other spaces, such as the green zone. We have a space called the [People’s Circle], where we have, like, a daily program. We also have the COP village, Aldeia COP, that received 3,500 Indigenous peoples lodged there. And we also have programming there for them.

So, we estimate that at least 5,000 Indigenous peoples were in the city from all over the world, participate in all of the spaces and also in this People’s Summit. So, it is here allowed that every people can bring their own demands, and they can protest, since they respect also the roles of the United Nations.

AMY GOODMAN: So, there are more Indigenous people, almost a thousand registered at this COP, than there have ever been. But there are also over 1,600 fossil fuel lobbyists. What effect does that have?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] So, this is exactly one of the biggest motivations that we had to try to guarantee the highest number of Indigenous peoples here. When we were in Dubai, we were celebrating 350 people in the blue zone. But in the end, we had like one Indigenous for seven fossil fuel and mining lobbyists. So, we were trying to work — we are working harder to try to overcome the Dubai numbers, so that we’re more — we have one Indigenous to each two lobbyists of the fossil fuel and mining, so this distance, this gap, is getting smaller. So we would like to overcome this and be the, like, the biggest participation in them.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s not clear if it’s as a result of the protests, but in the last few days, Brazil has recognized the Indigenous land rights of — in a way that it hadn’t before. Do you think that is because of the protests that took place last week?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] This announcement is the result of hard work and engagement of the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples and the FUNAI, the Indigenous agency, so that we can come here with concrete results to show. Besides the land demarcation entitling, we also announced the commitment to protect and title 63 million hectares in the commitment, the intergovernmental land commitment. And from the 63, 59 million hectares are lands that will be protected or titled by the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples, but we also have more power from the Ministry of Equality, Racial Equality. So, all these lands that were announced yesterday is the result of the engagement and the coordination that the Ministry of Indigenous People has been doing internally in the government to have these results announced here.

AMY GOODMAN: Not long before the COP began, Brazilian President Lula approved oil drilling off the coast of the Amazon. He’s been criticized by many environmentalists. Can you respond to this as his minister, his Indigenous minister?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] First, it’s important to clarify that it’s not the liberation for oil exploitation. It was the authorization for the studies to understand the impact of the oil exploitation in this area. So, also, it’s important to say that Mr. President Lula announced here the phaseout mapping of oil exploitation so that we could, like, create alternatives and phase out, because it’s really common that sometimes oil will be, like, lacking from some cities, and there will not be any other alternatives for that communities to move. But then it’s important to have a clear method and a clear, like, actions, so that we can diminish our dependency of the oil and look for other alternatives. And we are committed to that.

AMY GOODMAN: President Lula has also talked about a fossil fuel phaseout plan. Do you think this is possible? And what are the forces working against that?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] It’s always a challenge. It’s really — it’s not simple. It’s hard, because there is a dispute, a big one, with the economic sectors, so that these changes do not happen. So we need to make sure that agreements done at COP and commitments done at COP can tackle this, because the world knows the impact that oil exploitation, fossil fuels does, the risk of us achieving the point of no return, but these sectors, the economic sectors, need to understand this is an emergency. So we need to have, like, a clear decision here in this conference to stop depending on fossil fuel.

AMY GOODMAN: The violence against Indigenous land defenders in Latin America is the worst in the world. I’m wondering how you think Lula is dealing with that, how you think it can be dealt with. The number of deaths continues as people try to protect the land. What measures have been taken?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] Brazil has just launched a national plan for defenders — of defender. We are also working to approve Escazú Agreement, passed by the House of Representatives, and now it’s going to the Senate. We really think it is important that that will be also approved, not only by the House of Representatives, but also the Senate. And there is a big effort of the Brazilian government and the executive power to work to guarantee this approval.

We also have a plan to combat the racism, that is also being launched by the Brazilian government, and a security — like, a public security plan, because, unfortunately, we have in the Indigenous territories 60% of the force of the justice — Ministry of Justice is there trying to combat violence and attacks in the Indigenous territories, but we know that the forces, like the military forces or security, is not the only way of combating the attacks. We need to get public policies to get into the territories and advance the demarcation as a way of doing this.

AMY GOODMAN: You and Alessandro Korap Munduruku and other Indigenous leaders took on Bolsonaro in a big way. Can you talk about the significance of him being sentenced to decades in prison and what his presidency meant for Brazil, particularly Indigenous people?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] It was a really hard moment for Indigenous peoples in Brazil. Together with the neglect and the offensive attack from Bolsonaro, we also had a pandemic, where he not only neglected the pandemic, but also he was responsible for some measures that was against us. He attacked our rights, took our rights. It was a very challenging and hard moment.

We reacted. We organized. We were fundamental to be able to destroy fascism. So, Bolsonaro now is judged and condemned. And we really expect that the justice will be done. And if he’s sent to prison, we expect he will be paying for all his crimes. And that’s what we expect that justice can recognize, and so he can pay for everything he has done against us.

AMY GOODMAN: President Trump, the president of the United States, has increased the tariffs on Brazil until the case is dropped against Bolsonaro, the case against him attempting a coup against Lula, in the same way that President Trump was accused of attempting a coup in the United States. What do you think of Trump demanding that Bolsonaro not go through the justice system, not be imprisoned?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] This isn’t acceptable. And that’s why President Lula was very firm, and he has a strong position to defend the sovereignty of our country and system of democracy. And the Brazilian people was together with him, besides him, and supporting his position to defend our sovereignty.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to ask you about criticism of the COP being in Belém. On the one hand, it brings the world’s focus to the gateway to the Amazon. On the other hand, people have said, you know, a four-lane highway was built that cut down some of the rainforest. What are your thoughts?

SÔNIA GUAJAJARA: [translated] I think, like, the first important thing is that this just, like, show and, like, make it clear the environmental and the racism that we still have. People were saying that there’s no condition for a COP to be able to be realized and organized here, and that was also a fruit of prejudice against the people that live here. So, beyond forests, people need to understand that we have culture, we have people, and we have a diversity of people that protects the Amazon. So, it’s important that the world know that it’s not only forests and animals that lives in the Amazon. There are people living there, people that are being attacked, assaulted. They’re having their rights violated, and that they need protection.

On the other side, here in the Amazon, access, the needs and demands coming from the population of infrastructure, because in many places we have a very hard access. So, who needs to say if there is bad or good impact is the people that lives here.

AMY GOODMAN: That is Brazil’s first minister of Indigenous peoples, Sônia Guajajara, here at the U.N. climate summit — that’s COP30 — in the Brazilian city of Belém, the gateway to the Amazon.

Next up, is the Amazon rainforest being pushed beyond the tipping point? We’ll speak with the world-renowned Brazilian climatologist Carlos Nobre. Stay with us.