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Yaku Mama Flotilla arrives in Belém do Pará for COP30

WE ARRIVE AT COP30 WITH A MESSAGE FROM THE HEART OF THE WORLD

WE ARRIVE AT COP30 WITH A MESSAGE FROM THE HEART OF THE WORLD BELÉM DO PARÁ, BRASIL —November 9, 2025. We are the mountain, the rivers, the living jungle. We are the seeds, the trees, the refuge. We are the territory of all lives. We are the Amazon, we are resistance. We are more than 60 leaders and women leaders of Indigenous Peoples from Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, Brazil, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, Mexico, and Indonesia. For one month, we have navigated 3,000 kilometers along the Napo and Amazon rivers—the same waters that centuries ago were a route of conquest—now transforming them into a path of resistance, dignity, and climate justice. We do not come to COP30 to ask for permission. We come to demand that climate policies be built from the territories, with justice for those of us who protect life. OUR JOURNEY During this journey through Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, and Brazil, the river spoke to us. We saw the blood of the earth in the water: rivers poisoned by illegal mining, oil spills that are never cleaned up, and waste that states have ignored for decades. The water—the primary source of life—is being turned into a threat for those who have protected it for millennia. We witnessed the machine of extermination operating without pause: mining, oil companies, logging, and hydroelectric dams, which continue the 500+ years of ecocide and genocide to fuel the consumption of the Global North, the main responsible party for this climate crisis. We saw defenders forced into exile for protecting life. We saw Indigenous youth blocked: without work or spaces for decision-making, forced to migrate. And we saw the most brutal hypocrisy: Brazil, the host of this COP30, is pushing for oil exploration at the mouth of the Amazon River—home to Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact. In Ecuador, the government is calling for a constituent assembly to repeal the rights of nature. While the world talks about climate action, it criminalizes and murders those who practice it. COP30 cannot continue deciding about us, without us. COP30 cannot continue to decide about us, without us. THE LIVING SOLUTIONS This journey showed us that viable and replicable solutions already exist—they are alive. At every stop, we exchanged monitoring methods, defense strategies, territorial governance systems, and spirituality. We heard different languages naming the same struggles, distinct worldviews defending the same principle: life is sacred and non-negotiable. We learned from peoples who have stopped extractivist projects through collective governance, who have confronted corporations and states, and won. This flotilla is living evidence: peoples from diverse Ancestral Nations flowing as a single river. We bring communication as a tool for territorial defense, creating our own narrative: territorial authorities with their own voice and legitimate governance systems. We bring the clarity that we are the answer. ot as ‘beneficiaries’ of programs designed in distant offices, but as authorities with the right to self-determination. The results speak for themselves: where Indigenous territory is recognized and respected, the jungle stands tall, the water is clean, and biodiversity thrives. WHAT WE DEMAND AT COP30 Without the Amazon, there is no future for humanity. We arrive in Belém with the following demands and proposals, which are common sense in the face of the environmental, economic, political, and spiritual crisis that the entire world is experiencing. 1. AMAZON FREE OF OIL AND MINING We demand the immediate prohibition of fossil fuel exploration and extraction in the Amazon and in all Indigenous territories worldwide. Only an Amazon free of extraction can guarantee the protection of defenders, preserve biodiversity, and ensure global climate resilience. The Amazon is not a resource to be exploited: it is a living being that requires immediate protection. 2. RECOGNITION OF TERRITORIES AS LIVING BEINGS WITH RIGHTS We demand that States legally recognize the Amazon, rivers, and all territories as living entities with their own rights, not as exploitable resources. This recognition must be translated into effective and binding legal protection. 3. INDIGENOUS TERRITORIAL SOVEREIGNTY ABOVE EXTRACTIVE LAWS We demand the recognition of Indigenous authority as legitimate and binding, superseding concessions and state laws that authorize extractivism. The self-determination of peoples cannot be subordinated to corporate or governmental interests. We demand the recognition and guarantee of full territorial rights. 4. REAL FREE, PRIOR, AND INFORMED CONSENT We demand that the energy transition be truly just, respecting Free, Prior, and Informed Consent without simulations or merely decorative consultations. We demand binding—not symbolic—participation in all negotiation spaces that affect our territories. 5. END TO FORCED EXILE AND EFFECTIVE PROTECTION FOR DEFENDERS We demand justice and concrete security guarantees, and an end to impunity regarding threats, assassinations, and criminalization. We demand an end to forced exile that uproots territorial defenders from their communities. States must ensure that those of us who defend the earth can remain peacefully in our communities. 6. BINDING INTEGRATION OF TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE We demand what is rightfully ours: that our ancestral knowledge and practices—applied science spanning thousands of years—be recognized and integrated into climate policies as replicable and globally acknowledged solutions, not as ‘folklore’ or ‘customs. 7. DIRECT FINANCING TO THOSE WHO PROTECT LIFE We demand agile climate funds, without intermediaries who profit from our conservation work, and with simplified access for Indigenous youth. The financing must flow directly to our territorial governance systems and to the new generations of defenders. 8. COMPENSATION FOR CLIMATE ADAPTATION AND CLEAN WATER We demand direct compensation so that Amazonian communities can strengthen their adaptation capabilities to a crisis they did not cause. Our territories are facing droughts, floods, and rivers poisoned by mining and oil. Compensation must include water decontamination, waste management, and investment in adaptation systems based on ancestral knowledge. These demands are non-negotiable because we are not negotiating our existence THE ANSWER IS US This flotilla does not end in Belém. It remains organized and ready to fight. We commit to remaining organized after COP30: to sustain communication and coordination among the participating organizations, and to collectively follow up on these demands

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Amazon Flotilla: Indigenous Peoples Must be at the Center of COP30 Climate Negotiations

Amazon Flotilla: Indigenous Peoples Must be at the Center of COP30 Climate Negotiations An extraordinary journey along the Amazon River just took place. The Yaku Mama Flotilla traveled over 1,800 miles from the Andes in Ecuador to Belém, Brazil, the host city of the next United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30). This is the first time in history that the COP will take place in the Amazon. Onboard the flotilla were Indigenous leaders, youth, women, and allies, traveling with a shared message: Indigenous peoples must be at the center of climate solutions. Their demands, which include halting fossil fuel extraction in the rainforest, securing direct access to climate finance, and ensuring the protection of their territories and rights, must be heard and acted upon. “The flotilla is a space to share experiences and reflect on issues that are discussed at COPs, but that have historically been addressed without the participation of Indigenous people.“– Alexis Grefa, a Kichwa youth representative from Santa Clara in Ecuador and a member of the flotilla’s organizing team, in an interview with El País Planning for the flotilla began soon after it was announced that COP30 would be hosted in Belém. Indigenous organizations across the Amazon Basin began planting and watering the seeds for a collective journey that would bring visibility to both their struggles and solutions to protect the rainforest. Rather than flying to the summit, they chose to travel by the rivers that connect their territories. And on October 13, the journey began. More than 50 participants from Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Colombia, Panama, Guatemala, Mexico, Indonesia, and Scotland departed from El Coca, Ecuador. Their boats display the image of Yaku Mama, meaning “Mother Water” in Quechua, a sacred river serpent that symbolizes protection and strength. The route the flotilla took retraced the path taken by Spanish colonizer Francisco de Orellana in 1541. While his expedition marked the beginning of colonization in the region, the flotilla became a journey of Indigenous solidarity and resistance against the continued destruction of the Amazon, the ancestral homes of Indigenous peoples. Before departing down river, the group climbed the Cayambe glacier high in the Ecuadorian Andes to emphasize the ecological connection between highlands and rainforest. In the city of El Coca, they held a protest by covering a statue of Francisco de Orellana as a rejection of the legacy of extractivism and violence he represents. There, they also held a symbolic funeral for fossil fuels in the streets where youth leaders carried a black cardboard coffin labeled “R.I.P. Petróleo.” “We are returning oil to where it belongs, the earth,” said Lucía Ixchiu, a K’iche’ woman from Guatemala, as she lit candles to honor environmental defenders who lost their lives in defense of their lands. Finally, as the flotilla continued toward Ecuador’s border with Peru, they stopped at Ecuador’s Yasuní National Park, an emblematic site of resistance to oil drilling. A Platform for Demands Rooted in Territory Along the way, the flotilla stopped in Indigenous and local communities to share knowledge and amplify urgent demands. These include: These demands from the flotilla participants stem from their lived experience in territories affected by oil spills, illegal mining, deforestation, and harmful infrastructure projects that are relentless. Solidarity Across Borders ainforest Foundation US (RFUS) was proud to support the Yaku Mama Flotilla during its passage through Peru along with our Indigenous partner, the Organization of the Indigenous Peoples of the Eastern Amazon (ORPIO). This collaboration brought participants to communities where they visited community-led sustainable enterprises and learned how community members are using monitoring technology to strengthen territorial defense. In Peru’s northeastern Amazonian city of Iquitos, the flotilla joined the Floating Amazon Film Festival, where cinema brought to life stories of Indigenous resistance and self-determination. In a Tikuna community in Peru, community members welcomed the participants with dances and songs celebrating life. There, well-known Peruvian Amazonian singer Rossy War joined her voice with those of the Amazonian peoples, reminding everyone that music, too, can heal rivers. The flotilla then continued through the tri-border region of Peru, Colombia, and Brazil, where interconnected territories form the world’s largest contiguous expanse of lands inhabited by Indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation. These lands are also biodiversity strongholds. In a Tikuna community on the Brazilian side, participants learned about traditional ecological knowledge passed down through generations. Practices in natural medicine, fishing, and peaceful, sustained coexistence with the forest offered living models of a possible future. In Leticia, Colombia, flotilla members met with Indigenous leaders engaged in public policy advocacy. The conversations highlighted the importance of regional coordination amongst Indigenous peoples and the need to ensure that Indigenous voices shape national and international decisions on climate and Indigenous peoples’ land rights. The Road to COP30 The Yaku Mama Flotilla arrived in Belém on November 9, the day before COP30 began. Its journey through the rivers and territories of the Amazon served as a reminder that Indigenous peoples are key actors shaping the future of our planet. They have managed vast rainforest territories for millennia. These rainforests regulate rainfall, store carbon, and shelter immense biodiversity and sociocultural diversity. In recent years, several studies have provided statistical evidence confirming that lands legally titled to Indigenous peoples are the most effective models for forest protection. “We want to achieve more than just guaranteeing money or financing. We want to reach a consensus where Indigenous territories are no longer sacrificed. This is the COP of the Amazon because we are here, demanding and taking the places that we deserve.”– Lucía Ixchiu, K’iche’ leader from Guatemala told Reuters in an interview Source: Rainforest Foundation

Flotilla participants during filming in Iquitos, Peru

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Floating Cinema and Audiovisual Creation

Floating Cinema and Audiovisual Creation By: Lucia Ixchiu. We departed from the port of Tabatinga, heading upriver to immerse ourselves in a journey of floating cinema. From Iquitos, and several months prior, the team from the Muyuna collective—a group of artists, filmmakers, and cultural managers who have embraced cinema as a tool for territorial defense—expressed their desire to join and share their work and what they do best: community filmmaking. The day began with a call to a sharing circle where we moved our bodies, danced, and received the first instructions for what would be the start of a process that, for many of the Indigenous youth attending, was their first-ever film workshop. A storytelling exercise allowed us to unite our voices at the beginning of a collective, community-driven, and floating process. This process took place over four of the five days we navigated the Marañón River, with the lush jungle as our backdrop. It was a time of work sessions, dialogue, and learning for the entire flotilla, with everyone participating in one way or another. Cinema, cameras, and all our creativity took over the boat’s top deck. On this vessel, three groups were thinking, writing, and filming their movies, guided by the Muyuna team. On this boat, dreams have been part of the entire journey. Filming and initial edits took shape during the stretch from Tabatinga to Manaus, where the idea of creating a film festival for the flotilla’s audiovisual creations was born. This makes the journey even more inspiring—to tell and narrate our own story from our diversity, from the different languages and biomes that are part of the Yaku Mama. Making dreams come true. For some of the attendees, besides it being their first time leaving their country, it was also the first time they held a camera, a clapperboard, and sound equipment. To dream of using cinema not only to tell our stories but also to create a space to defend our territory.

Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla on its way to Atalaia do Norte - Brazil.Photo: Hackeo Cultural

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Javari Valley: Where Defending Life Means Respecting the Right to No-Contact

Javari Valley: Where Defending Life Means Respecting the Right to No-Contact Logbook of the Visit to the Yavarí Valley on the Road to COP30 From the Amazon River After navigating from the Ecuadorian Andes and crossing Peru via the Napo and Amazon rivers, we arrived in one of the most remote and sensitive regions on the planet: the Javari Valley, at the triple border of Brazil, Peru, and Colombia. At this meeting point of waters and borders, we brought our message to the heart of the world’s largest refuge for Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact (PIACI): peoples who choose to live without contact with outside society and whose existence depends directly on the integrity of the forests that shelter them. “We are born of water, and to water we return, because where water is born, life is born; and where life is born, a people is born.” — Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla From the peaks of Cayambe to the Yasuní, we sail to transform the pain of extractivism into collective strength. In the Javari Valley, that strength translated into an urgent call to protect the lives of those who only ask that their right to exist be respected. A Border Under Pressure The Javari Valley is not just a sanctuary of biodiversity: it is a territory under siege. Routes for drug trafficking, logging, illegal hunting, and mining converge here, in one of the most fragile and dangerous areas of the Amazon. It is also the territory where, in 2022, journalist Dom Phillips and indigenist Bruno Pereira were murdered while documenting these very threats. The Flotilla’s crew met with representatives of the Union of Indigenous Peoples of the Javari Valley (UNIVAJA) to learn firsthand about the situation of the PIACI. They also shared experiences with members of the Regional Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the East (ORPIO) from Peru, who, alongside UNIVAJA, are leading the Javari–Tapiche Territorial Corridor initiative—a transboundary effort seeking to protect over 16 million hectares of continuous forests, ensuring the physical and cultural survival of the PIACI. A recent report from the GTI-PIACI (2024) confirmed an alarming trend: 50% of the territories of Indigenous Peoples in Isolation in South America overlap with 4,665 mining concessions or applications, many related to “critical” minerals for the so-called energy transition. Gold accounts for 42% of these pressures, followed by tin (24%) and lithium (10%). In Brazil, where much of the Javari Valley is located, 58 PIACI records are directly affected by these activities. Risk maps created by local organizations also reveal the expansion of drug trafficking routes, illegal roads, and extractive operations within territories that should remain untouched. “The protection of the Javari–Tapiche Corridor is not just a local issue; it is a global responsibility. Guaranteeing the legal security of these territories and strengthening Indigenous governance is the most effective strategy to conserve the Amazon.”— Wakemo, young Waorani spokesperson for the Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla A Lethal and Invisible Threat The lack of official recognition and demarcation of PIACI territories not only violates fundamental rights but also puts lives at immediate risk. Their high immunological vulnerability, a result of centuries of isolation, means that even a common cold introduced by an invader can be fatal. Documented cases from past decades show how simple, accidental contacts led to the disappearance of entire peoples. Therefore, preventive protection, through exclusion zones and permanent monitoring, is the only truly ethical and viable policy. Demands for COP30: No to an Energy Transition at the Expense of the PIACI As the Flotilla advances towards Manaus and then Belém, where its journey will culminate at COP30, it carries a firm message: the energy transition cannot replicate fossil fuel injustices or sacrifice Indigenous territories in the name of the climate. From the heart of the Amazon, the Flotilla will demand: The Silence That Also Speaks The Peoples in Isolation have no speakers at summits or in the media. Their silence is, in itself, a form of resistance and a call to humanity. The Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla sails for them, for the rivers, and for the rights the world has yet to hear. Because to defend their existence is to defend the balance of the entire planet. “We continue sailing, carrying the voices of those who defend life, and the silence of those who only ask for their right to exist to be recognized.”

Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla arriving in Monterrico - Angoteros, Peru.Photo: Hackeo Cultural

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A Struggle Without Borders

A Struggle Without Borders Logbook of the Second Week of the Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla on the Road to COP30 Political borders are imaginary lines; rivers, on the other hand, are the living veins that connect a single body. That was the great lesson of our second week on this journey: a voyage that led us across the invisible boundaries between Ecuador, Peru, and Colombia, proving that our struggle—like the water—flows freely, uniting peoples, languages, and hearts. Our ancestors navigated these same rivers. For them, water did not divide: it was the path. Today, on this flotilla, we feel that same connection. We crossed borders that historically fragmented the territories of sibling peoples like the Kichwa, Siekopai, Shuar, and Tikuna. Every transfer between boats, every change of flag, reminded us that we are a single Amazon people defending the same territory: the territory of life. Education as Resistance in the Peruvian Jungle Today, on this flotilla, we feel that same connection. We crossed borders that historically fragmented the territories of sibling peoples like the Kichwa, Siekopai, Shuar, and Tikuna. Every transfer between boats, every change of flag, reminded us that we are a single Amazon people defending the same territory: the territory of life. Since 1975, this institution has been a pioneer in intercultural bilingual education. Here, Kichwa is not just a subject: it is the language in which students learn, dream, and build the future. Students from 29 communities, including the Siekopai, live in a boarding school where they are taught that ancestral wisdom and modern knowledge can walk together. This school is a seed of resistance: a reminder that educating in the language of the territory is also a way of defending it. Technology and Ancestral Guardianship in Vista Hermosa A six-hour navigation brought us, on October 19th, to an island on the Napo River: the community of Vista Hermosa. They were waiting for us on the shore with banners and songs against mining and oil. Their welcome had the strength of those who know what is at stake. As night fell, they shared their greatest achievement with us: a satellite territorial monitoring system, managed by the Kichwa, Ticuna, and Matsés communities themselves, in partnership with ORPIO and Rainforest Foundation US. Using drones, GPS, and satellite alerts, they patrol one million hectares, guarding the forest against logging and extractive invasions. But the most inspiring part is who leads this defense: the women. They organize the patrols, generate the alerts, and have even created “community nurseries” to care for their children while they protect the territory. Vista Hermosa showed us that technology can be a tool of love and guardianship when it is used from the root. Encountering the Great River and the Memory of Rubber That same day, we reached the port of Mazán. After a short trip by mototaxi, it appeared before us: the majestic Amazon River. Although the Napo is immense, the Amazon is on another scale: it is a force that envelops you, reminding you how small you are in the face of its greatness. From there, we continued to Iquitos, the largest river city in Peru, built on a history of exploitation and pain: the rubber boom. Today, its streets and docks preserve the memory of a time of slavery and deforestation, but also the will to heal. Arriving in Iquitos was a milestone: a thousand kilometers navigated, and a deep conviction to transform that memory into justice. The Amazon Venice and the Threat of Flooding On October 20th, we visited the Belén neighborhood, known as the “Amazon Venice.”Its floating houses, its markets of fruits and natural medicines, and its daily rhythm in sync with the river show an admirable adaptation to the pulse of the water. But that pulse is changing. The floods, increasingly extreme due to climate change and deforestation, threaten the lives of thousands of families. Belén is a mirror of the climate crisis: a place where resilience becomes a way of life, even when the threat comes from far away. Cinema, Wisdom, and Indigenous Governance That afternoon, on Muyuna beach, cinema floated alongside us. We participated in a Floating Film Festival, where audiovisual works created by the crew members themselves were screened. It was a moment of collective introspection: seeing ourselves on screen was also recognizing ourselves in the struggles of other territories. On October 21st, we shared a workday with the Regional Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the East (ORPIO). There, visions and strategies intersected: OPIAC from Colombia spoke about territorial monitoring in the face of armed groups; representatives from the Sierra Nevada shared their progress in solar energy; and the Waorani from Ecuador told of their historic resistance to oil in Yasuní. We left those tables with a certainty: living solutions already exist, and they are in our communities. The Triple Frontier and Art as Resistance Between October 22 and 25, we arrived in Leticia, Colombia, the point where the borders of Colombia, Peru, and Brazil dissolve into the river Here, at the Indigenous Cuisine Festival, we shared food, knowledge, and laughter, confirming that the Amazon cultural matrix is one: the jungle that feeds us, heals us, and allows us to exist. We met again with OPIAC, which shared its experience in creating the Indigenous-led Health System and the struggle for the demarcation of reserves. On October 25th, we crossed to the Tikuna Community of San Juan de Barranco, where we were received with the Pelazón ceremony: a ritual that celebrates the transition from girl to woman and honors the continuity of life. That day, Amazon artist Rosi War joined her voice with the community’s in a concert that resonated like a collective song for the jungle. This week taught us that although the threats are global, so is the resistance. We crossed physical borders, but above all, we broke down the borders that separate us.We continue sailing, more united and stronger, towards Belém—where the Amazon will rise to demand that the world listen to the call

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The River Unites Us: From the Andes to the Amazon, We Sail to Heal the Earth

From the Andes to the Amazon: The First Steps of the Yaku Mama Amazonian Flotilla’s Journey Quito, the Ecuadorian capital located at the center of the world, high in the Andes Mountains. Belém, the capital of the state of Pará, Brazil, situated on the Amazon River as it flows towards its mouth in the Atlantic Ocean. More than 3,000 km not only measure the distance between these two points on a map but also encompass the diverse habitats of biological diversity and the cultural coexistence of Indigenous peoples and nationalities of South America, from the peaks of the glaciers to the depths of the Amazon. Our goal is to reach COP30, the UN Climate Change Conference. This year, it will be held in Belém do Pará. The starting point of our journey is Quito. Along our route, we are documenting with the intention of making visible the problems of mining, oil exploitation, deforestation, climate change, and their environmental impact on our communities. Our path is guided by the flow of water, from glaciers and high-altitude páramos to the dense Amazon rainforest, in a vital cycle from which we take our name: Amazon Flotilla Yaku Mama. We began the river journey in the port city of Francisco de Orellana, better known as El Coca. This choice had symbolic value, as it was from this very point on February 12, 1542, that the boats of the colonizer who gave the city its name set sail. Today, at this same latitude, over 60 Indigenous and nature defense organizations are setting out with the intention of confronting our colonial and extractivist past, to transform the pain of devastation into collective action. “This flotilla is not just a protest; it is a living message sailing through the veins of the Amazon. The river itself shows us its scars: the oil slicks, the wound of mining. We are not just coming to bring a problem to COP30; we are coming to present the solutions that our peoples and the forest have cultivated for millennia.” – Alexis Grefa, a young Kichwa Amazonian from Ecuador. As the Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla, we sail with a collective call for Climate Justice on our way to COP30, the most significant international event under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Our message is clear: the era of fossil fuels in the Amazon must end. We do not want the Amazon to become a new sacrifice zone. From the Cayambe Glacier to the Amazon River “Glaciers, rivers, and the rainforest are not separate worlds. They are a single body, a Sacred cycle that sustains life.” – Leo Cerda, Indigenous leader and activist October 9. Cayambe, Pichincha, Ecuador. The first point of the expedition was the Cayambe Volcano, at over 4,600 meters above sea level in the Andes Mountains of Ecuador. Even here, so far from populated centers, in a space that appears purely natural and even inhospitable to humans, the effects of climate change are visible: the snow recedes year after year, and the glacier’s surface area has shrunk. Other glaciers in the region are suffering the same fate. According to a report by the MapBiomas Water initiative, between 1985 and 2022, 184,000 hectares (56%) of glacier surface area were lost in the Amazon countries. The loss of glaciers has a direct impact on altering rain cycles, soil degradation, and access to water, which makes the populations dependent on these ecosystems vulnerable. It is also a clear sign of global warming; without ice and glaciers, the planet will lose its reserves of water, a basic element for life. It is significant that our journey symbolically begins here, an invitation to reflect on the impact of environmental damage in the region. It invites us to understand how two apparently separate worlds are connected: the Sierra (Andes Mountains) and the Amazon. From glaciers like Cayambe comes the water that feeds the rainforest, flowing all the way to the Amazon River before returning to the highlands in a sacred cycle. On top of Mama Cayambe, a sacred huaca for the Andean Kichwa peoples, we held an ancestral ceremony focused on the importance of glaciers, the Andean páramos, and their connection to the Amazon. Here, we also raised a message calling for awareness that this cycle is threatened by deforestation and climate change. We began our journey after greeting and gathering the energy and strength of the Indigenous peoples of the Andescommunities in resistance like the Kayambi, Otavalo, Natabuela, and Karanki. We visited emblematic sites in the city of Quito, rested, and organized the logistics and luggage for our overland trip to descend from the Andes to the Amazon. Anti-Hegemonic Narratives and Amazon Youth in Defense of the Amazon from Climate Change October 13. Serena, Napo, Ecuador. From the heights of the páramos and the cold mountain wind, we headed to the heart of the Kichwa Amazonian territory in the Napo province. We followed a road that runs along the riverbank until we reached a pedestrian bridge that leads to the community of Serena. We began the day with a welcoming ceremony, introductions, and giving thanks to the elements. The community received us with a traditional breakfast in the warmth that characterizes humid tropical climates, setting the tone for our journey to Belém. Serena is renowned for its activism and leadership in territorial defense and climate action. This region has been affected by gold mining, which causes forest destruction, contamination of water sources, and ecosystem degradation. Among Serena’s most recognized initiatives are the World Indigenous Youth Forum on Climate Change and the Yuturi Warmi Indigenous Guard, the latter led by over 40 Indigenous women. Here, we participated in the Workshop: “Anti-Hegemonic Narratives and Amazonian Youth in Defense of the Amazon from Climate Change.” It was a space for collective creation to devise strategies that allow us to transform words and art into tools for defending our territory, culture, and life. We developed reflections that allow us to see our personal, community, territorial,

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Indigenous Flotilla Arrives in Peru to Share More Stories of Amazonian Resistance

Indigenous Flotilla Arrives in Peru to Share More Stories of Amazonian Resistance “Today we set foot on land in Iquitos,” says Lucia Ixchiu, part of the Yaku Mama Amazon Flotilla‘s Coordination team. By EmergentesOctober 23, 2025 15:50By Lucía Ixchiu Amidst the heat that embraces the Amazon jungle, after crossing the border from Ecuador to Peru and stopping at the Island of Yarina, we continued towards Iquitos, the largest city in the world inaccessible by road. We docked around 4 PM and said goodbye to the pilots and boats that had accompanied us for several days. We arrived at the place where we would stay for the next three days of this journey upriver. Finally, we left the Napo River and met the immense Amazon River. Between lines for food, lines to unload luggage, lines for mototaxis, and lines to board the buses that would take us to where we would sleep, we finally had the chance to stretch our backs on something other than the floor. This journey is a profound existential transformation and, in my view, a precious gift for traveling one of the routes that allows us to traverse not only the river but also our inner selves. After disembarking, we still feel, for days on end, the sensation of being on the water. Arriving at the hotel amidst the chaos and traffic was, without a doubt, another adventure. We were finally able to sleep and rest our bodies to continue the next day with an agenda led by Muyuna—a floating cinema collective from the city that works amidst the waters. We began our tour in the Belén neighborhood, where we saw a peculiar market with all kinds of plants and species that only exist in the Amazon jungle—turtle eggs, edible grubs, diverse smells, and a polluted river were part of the scene, in stark contrast to the living rivers we had been observing before reaching the city. The city of Iquitos floods from December to May every year, and the population learned to live this way a long time ago. I find this surprising due to their ability to adapt to reality, although, of course, the changes and floods are also an effect of biodiversity destruction. After lunch, we headed to the port to continue traveling through the lagoons and rivers of these territories. We arrived at Muyuna beach, or Isla Bonita, where we held an act of solidarity with Brazil. Yesterday, we learned that an offshore oil exploration license was granted to Petrobras. It is very powerful and painful that, in the midst of the flotilla, these things still happen, but at least we are together to support each other across territories. Touching the earth is also part of this journey on water. Our Mayan ancestors said that part of balance is harmonizing water, fire, air, and earth, and that is what we seek now. We are drawing strength from the land, looking for a bit of calm to continue venturing into this jungle that is so intense and beautiful at the same time. This trip dismantles myths and stereotypes about the jungle. Being here is not easy or romantic, but that’s how life is. The rashes on our skin and the thousands of bites from bugs, fleas, and mosquitoes remind us that honoring nature and being part of it also means accepting all of this—that leaving our comfort zone is part of breaking away from the convenience and parasitism of cities, and that returning to the land is anything but simple. The jungle has its own time, its own rules, and its own path. Thank you to it for welcoming us and teaching us to walk with it. Source: MidiaNinja