"The Cerro Yapacana, a sandstone butte reaching 4,415 feet above sea level in Venezuela’s corner of the Amazon rainforest, is home to wildlife that can be found nowhere else in the world. With its distinctive tabletop shape, the geological landmark is known by Indigenous communities in this region of South America as a tepui, or "House of God."
"The advocacy groups Amazon Conservation Association in Washington and SOS Orinoco in Venezuela used high-resolution imagery to identify at least 8,000 mining camps or pieces of machinery in the park’s lowlands. The group found 425 more camps or pieces of machinery at the top of the tepui."
"Cristina Vollmer Burelli, the founder of SOSOrinoco, said the group has been issuing warnings about the destruction since 2018, while "the world focused in other parts of the Amazon."
"Here, analysts and locals say, Venezuelan authorities are not only allowing illegal mining and armed groups in a protected national park — some are profiting from it... Nicolas Maduro, appearing at the COP27 climate conference in Egypt last month, called for the protection of the Amazon[, blaming] the “great damage” to the rainforest on capitalism. He didn’t mention the role his government is said to have played by allegedly allowing illegal mining."
