Monday briefing: How​ the work of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira carries on, three ​years after their killing

The Guardian

3 hours ago

Good morning.
Last week marked the third anniversary of the disappearance of the longtime Guardian contributor Dom Phillips and the Brazilian Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira in the Amazon rainforest. They were found dead 10 days later, murdered as they tried to warn the world about the Amazon's destruction.
In the time since, the environmental defenders and journalists who knew them have tried to secure their legacy, through projects to train a new generation of Indigenous activists to protect their home from organised crime and industrial deforestation – and through reporting.
On Thursday, as part of that project, the first two episodes of a new Guardian podcast, Missing in the Amazon, were published; the third went up this morning. The series, an astonishingly evocative and diligent piece of work, is presented by Dom's friend and Guardian colleague, Tom Phillips.
For today's newsletter, I spoke to Tom about the series – how it came about, the wrenching toll and deep consolations of putting it together, and the picture of the future of the rainforest that it presents. Here are the headlines.
US politics | Tensions flared in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday as hundreds of US national guard troops were deployed by Donald Trump as thousands took to the streets to protest against an immigration crackdown. Teargas and 'less-lethal munitions' were used by police to disperse huge crowds, who surrounded civic buildings and blocked a freeway. California governor Gavin Newsome accused Trump of manufacturing a crisis.
Israel-Gaza | The activists sending an aid ship into Gaza carrying climate activist Greta Thunberg accused Israel of forcibly intercepting the vessel and confiscating its cargo. Israel's defence minister, Israel Katz, said the passengers would be shown video of the 7 October attacks.
UK economy | Rachel Reeves has been locked in a standoff over the policing and council budgets just days before this week's spending review, which is set to give billions to the NHS, defence and technology.
Culture | Ministers have asked the British Council to draw up spending plans which would force it to close in as many as 60 countries, sources have told the Guardian.
Environment | Environmental groups have welcomed government proposals to ban the destructive fishing practice known as bottom trawling in half of England's protected seas.
A few weeks after Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira went missing, Tom sat down in Rio de Janeiro with João Laet, a photographer with deep experience of the Amazon who had also known Dom, and talked about what to do next. 'We did what journalists do,' he said. 'We decided to just report, to carry on, to do even more of it. A couple of weeks later, we were back in a different part of the Amazon – and we've been doing it ever since.'
The podcast has been one of the centrepieces of Tom's part of that work. Over the last three years, he has travelled thousands of miles through the jungle by helicopter, plane, boat and on foot in an effort to understand what happened, and to shed new light on the stories that the two men thought were so important.
The series presents a painstaking, beautifully attentive portrait of Dom and Bruno, and the powerful investigative thread of the search for their killers; meanwhile, the story of the violence done to the Amazon by organised crime and industrial deforestation, and the Indigenous people fighting to protect it, plays out in vivid detail. 'We wanted to make sure their lives and legacies were properly remembered,' Tom said. 'I hope they'd be proud of it.'
Where threats to the Amazon stand today
When Dom and Bruno went missing, the far-right demagogue Jair Bolsonaro was president of Brazil, and widely viewed as having nurtured the climate in which their attackers could feel they had impunity.
Bolsonaro's defeat to the leftist former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva later that year was a genuine turning point for the Amazon, Tom said. 'Lula was accompanied at his inauguration by Raoni, one of Brazil's most revered Indigenous leaders. He appointed Marina Silva, a hugely respected environmentalist, as his environment minister. He gave Bruno's widow, Beatriz Matos, a top job in a new ministry for Indigenous peoples. He started putting resources into the environmental agency, so it could crack down on deforestation and crime. So all of that is very good news.'
At the same time, he said, 'the fundamental fact is that lots of things haven't changed. Deforestation has come down massively – but there is still a great deal of destruction going on. You have a right-wing congress which is trying to undermine Indigenous rights and environmental protection. Organised crime has grown in the last few years.' And there is the prospect of a far-right successor to Bolsonaro prevailing in next year's presidential election.
In the Javari valley, where Dom and Bruno were killed, Tom said 'all the activists I know still receive threats – every time I come home, I wonder if I'm going to see those people again.' He points to one bleak symbol in particular: a floating federal police base deployed to the valley, called New Era, which has subsequently been withdrawn.
How Dom and Bruno's friends and allies responded to their deaths
In a story published last week, and further explored later in the podcast series, Tom describes the extraordinary journey he and João Laet took deep into some of the most inaccessible territory in the Javari valley alongside members of the Indigenous patrol group that Bruno helped to found. The group, named Evu, works to train activists to protect the rainforest and rivers from poachers, fishers, miners and drug traffickers; against just a dozen members in 2021, there are 120 today, an expansion driven by the determination to secure Bruno's legacy.
'These are the same people without whom Dom and Bruno might never have been found,' Tom said. 'Three years ago, I was blown away by their skill, their dedication, their persistence. And now they're not just stepping up in the region, but exporting the model to other parts of the Amazon and Latin America.'
The work is astonishingly gruelling: Tom describes joining the team as they carried two aluminium canoes on their shoulders on a hike of 100km in six days through dense rainforest. At the end of their journey, they provided the canoes – and training – to the last of their six mobile teams. Since coming back, 'I haven't been able to put a pair of shoes on for a week,' Tom said ruefully. 'My left knee isn't really bending properly. I fell in the river and lost my glasses. It's been slightly exhausting, but a privilege.'
Meanwhile, a group of journalists led by Guardian global environment editor Jonathan Watts and Dom's widow Alessandra Sampaio has been at work on the project that Dom was engaged in when he died – the completion of a book called How to Save the Amazon, in which Bruno is an essential character. 'No reader should be in any doubt that these pages have been stained by blood,' Dom's co-authors write. 'The killers blasted a gaping wound in this book that is far too great for any infusion of solidarity to heal.'
'It's all part of the same project,' Tom said. 'I got my copy in Portuguese the other day. It was an incredibly uplifting thing to receive – this feeling that in some sense, Dom's mission had been accomplished.'
Has the crime been solved?
In July 2022, three men were charged with the murder of Dom and Bruno: Amarildo da Costa Oliveira and Jefferson da Silva Lima, who confessed to the killing but have argued that they acted in self-defence; and Oseney da Costa de Oliveira, who was accused of a lesser role, but who subsequently saw the charges dropped – though he is still under house arrest pending a possible new charge.
But that left the question of why. In November last year, the alleged mastermind of the attack was charged with arming and funding those responsible. He was identified in Brazilian press reports as Ruben Dario da Silva Villar, a shadowy business person in the Javari Valley who has been accused of running an illegal poaching operation, money laundering, and drug smuggling, but never convicted. Others have been charged as accessories who helped to conceal the bodies.
The fifth episode of the series will examine whether Dom and Bruno's deaths were the result of a wider conspiracy. Among Indigenous activists, 'There is a frustration that it has taken so long,' Tom said.
'There's a real worry that if the two fishers are convicted, it will just end there. People want to see proof of a real inclination from the authorities to dig into whether there were more powerful criminal figures behind the murders, and what they might reveal about the region's struggle with political and police corruption in a hugely important narco corridor for cocaine going from Peru to Europe.'
What has it been like to tell Dom and Bruno's story?
As he worked on the series, 'I thought a lot about the fact that Dom left his house one day for what he would not have seen as one of his most dangerous reporting trips, said goodbye, and never came back,' Tom said. 'So yes, it's been traumatic. But it's been therapeutic, too, to have the time and space to try to do this story justice.'
There has been a deep poignancy in spending so much time talking to people about his friend – and even the parts of his story that were very far from the Amazon. 'We nearly always talked about our affection for Brazil, and the work of reporting here,' Tom said. But as the second episode of the series sets out, Dom had a whole other life in London in the 1990s, where he was editor of Mixmag, and a passionate connoisseur of dance music.
'I was only a teenager, but that was part of my world back then too,' Tom said. 'I really wish now that we had talked more about those days.'
Sign up to First Edition
Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters
after newsletter promotion
As he says on the podcast, a thread runs through all of Dom's life, whether going toe-to-toe with a superstar DJ in a row over a coverline in the queue for Ministry of Sound or reporting deep in the Javari valley: 'The backbone, the commitment to his ideas. When Dom decided he cared about something, or that it really mattered, he went all-in. And in the end, that was what set him on the path to the Amazon.'
After being told for decades that there was no market for her work, Bernardine Evaristo is now one of the most in-demand authors. I loved this interview with her, where she talks about how she's handled being thrust into the spotlight. Aamna
Mercury prize​-nominated singer Gwenno sings in Cornish and Welsh. She recently visited a school in Cornwall and used music to encourage the children to see Cornish as a living language. Katy Vans, newsletters team
Labour's housebuilding agenda must prioritise social housing, writes Guardian columnist John Harris, warning that failing to build more council homes will deepen social decay and fuel dangerous right-wing forces. Aamna
​This fascinating essay by Alice Bolin argues for challenging the 'great man' theory of history … before our obsession with tech bros goes too far. Katy
Looting and trafficking of Syria's antiquities has surged to unprecedented levels since rebels overthrew the former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in December, experts warn, putting the country's heritage further at risk. Aamna
Tennis | Pulling off one of the greatest comebacks in the history of the sport, Carlos Alcaraz toppled the world No 1, Jannik Sinner, 4-6, 6-7 (4), 6-4, 7-6 (3), 7-6 (10-2) after five hours and 29 minutes to defend his French Open title in Paris.
Cycling | Teenage prodigy Cat Ferguson came within a hair's breadth of executing a memorable overall win in her debut Tour of Britain, but was outsprinted by her rival Ally Wollaston at the climax of the final stage in Glasgow.
Football | Thomas Tuchel has said his England players must accept his straight-talking criticisms if they are to advance to World Cup glory. The manager did not hold back after the lacklustre performance in the 1-0 qualifying win against Andorra in Barcelona on Saturday, questioning their attitude and body language.
The Guardian leads with events in the US: 'Trump deploys national guard on LA streets in dramatic escalation'. The Financial Times reports 'Business chiefs head for Capitol Hill to fight Trump's foreign investment tax'. Looking ahead to the spending review, the Times has 'Cash boost to fight crime', while the Telegraph says 'Policing is broken, officers warn Reeves'. The i reports 'PIP benefit cuts may be softened to quash dissent against Reeves'.
The Mail leads with an investigation, under the headline 'Visa scam that makes mockery of PM's pledge on migration', while the Sun looks at the cost of migrant hotels with 'InnSane'. The Mirror leads with 'Donor blood red alert'.
Australia's mushroom murder trial
Justice and courts reporter Nino Bucci talks through the trial that has gripped Australia – of the woman accused of murdering three of her relatives with poisoned mushrooms over a family meal.
Sign up for Inside Saturday to see more of Edith Pritchett's cartoons, the best Saturday magazine journalism and an exclusive look behind the scenes
A bit of good news to remind you that the world's not all bad
The Scout Association has introduced a Money Skills badge to help young people gain practical financial literacy skills. Guardian Money observed members of a group of explorer scouts in London. Designed by Georgie Howarth, the badge incorporates the realities of managing money, forcing the group to adjust expectations based on their financial constraints.
Young explorer scouts, some of whom already have part-time jobs or allowances, found the programme valuable, particularly in preparing them for real-life financial decisions. One participant noted that school lessons often focus on topics like mortgages, which feel irrelevant to teenagers, whereas the Scout badge 'made me feel more prepared for the real world'.
Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday
And finally, the Guardian's puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow.
Quick crossword
Cryptic crossword
Wordiply