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Irish Times
2 days ago
- General
- Irish Times
Determined not to let his murder silence him, friends of Dom Phillips finish his book on the Amazon
Three years ago this Thursday, British journalist Dom Phillips set out on the long journey home after a research trip deep into the Amazon rainforest for a book he was writing. He never made it back to his wife Alê. Instead he was brutally murdered alongside his travelling companion, Brazilian indigenist Bruno Pereira. They were shot dead by a gang of illegal fishermen who viewed Bruno's efforts to help local indigenous communities protect their territory as a direct threat to their criminal livelihood. Dom had wanted to write about the conflict and the efforts to resolve it, which Bruno understood would have to include providing realistic alternatives to those whose living depended on illegal fishing. But in 2022 such a nuanced approach was lost in the rising lawlessness that gripped the Amazon during the far-right administration of Jair Bolsonaro , a government that declared the forest open to plunder by gutting its own agencies responsible for its protection. Instead Bruno was shot dead and Dom with him, most likely so there would be no witness to the crime. In the 12 days between the two being reported missing and the grim discovery of their bodies, burnt and hastily buried in a shallow grave, their friends had mobilised to pressure authorities into intensifying the initially underwhelming search effort. READ MORE This campaign provided a focus to Dom's colleagues, many of us caught between desperately hoping for news that he had emerged from the forest with another dramatic Amazonian adventure to tell but increasingly dreading the worst as the days passed. When word finally came that the bodies had been found, there was at least some consolation that Alê and Bruno's wife Bia could bring their husbands home, even if just for their funerals, rather than be left stranded in a limbo of uncertainty at their disappearance. Journalist Dom Phillips talks to two indigenous men in Aldeia Maloca Papiú, Roraima State, Brazil, in November 2019. Photograph: Joao Laet/AFP via Getty Images But among Dom's journalist friends as well as the shock and anger, there was also a determination, borne out of the initial mobilisation during those first agonising 12 days, that his murder would not silence him. Discussions turned to the possibility of completing How to Save the Amazon, the book he had not been given the chance of finishing himself. Alê quickly entrusted the project to a small editorial group of Dom's colleagues. She arrived from their home in Salvador for the funeral in Rio de Janeiro with a suitcase full of his electronic devices and his notebooks (which in classic reporter style were borderline illegible). [ Dom Phillips obituary: British journalist whose killing highlighted the plight of the Amazon Opens in new window ] These she handed over to Andrew Fishman, president of the investigative website the Intercept Brasil, who was a close friend of Dom's and an important sounding board as he developed his initial idea for the book. Reviewing the material, the group's initial task was to work out how much of the book Dom had completed and then what still needed to be done, and more importantly how and by who. Once the word spread that the project would continue, the editorial group was inundated with offers of help. This reflected the deep affection for Dom as a friend, and he was a great friend to many of us. It was also a demonstration of professional respect for someone who at the time of his death was recognised as one of the best foreign journalists working in Brazil. Alessandra Sampaio, widow of British journalist Dom Phillips, left, and Beatriz Matos, widow of Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira talk to indigenous people at Atalaia do Norte. Photograph: Fabiano Maisonnave/AP This meant the book would achieve the aim of our editorial group's co-ordinator Jonathan Watts, Dom's old friend from their days as correspondents based in Rio together and now the Guardian newspaper's global environment editor who lives much of the year in the Amazon. Jon wanted the book to be an act of solidarity with a colleague murdered because of his commitment to reporting from the remote front lines of a conflict that has profound consequences for our entire planet. Now, in time for the third anniversary of the murders, How to Save the Amazon is published, its original subtitle, Ask the People Who Know, poignantly changed to, A Journalist's Deadly Quest for Answers. [ The Dom Phillips I knew: A sensitive and selfless soul with a gift for lifelong friendships Opens in new window ] This is a necessary reflection of the cruel circumstances that meant others had to take on the task of finishing the book. But Dom's original subtitle remains hugely relevant. It informs the spirit of the book, which was Dom's modus operandi as a journalist: get out there, find the people who know, and ask the questions. (And with Dom it could be so many questions, until he was sure he understood what you were talking about and, more importantly, was convinced you did too.) It is also an optimistic book. The crisis in the Amazon can at times seem overwhelming. But Dom's insight was an important one: that the solutions to it are already being implemented, just the people in the rainforest making a positive difference need to be heard, their voices and insights amplified. His book, now out in the world, helps in that effort. It is a worthy legacy for a much-missed friend and colleague.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Advisory: Press Freedom Center to Host Panel on Investigative Journalism and the Fight to Save the Amazon
WASHINGTON, June 2, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- The Press Freedom Center at the National Press Club will be hosting an upcoming event focused on the book How to Save the Amazon: A Journalist's Fatal Quest for Answers. The discussion will explore the intersection of investigative journalism, environmental justice, and press freedom, highlighting the extraordinary and often perilous work of journalists reporting from the frontlines of ecological crises. How to Save the Amazon recounts the story of journalist Dom Phillips and his research partner Bruno Pereira, who were killed in 2022 while documenting the threats to the Amazon and its protectors. At the time of their deaths, the book was unfinished, but a team of journalists and friends — including Dom's wife, Alessandra Sampaio — worked together to complete the volume. Three years later, it is a finished product that sheds light on the critical role of journalism in exposing environmental destruction and government inaction. It also extensively covers the relationship between the Amazon and indigenous populations of Brazil and sheds light on how much can be learned about this region of the world from the people who have lived in it and protected it. The panel will take place on Wednesday, June 11, at 6:00pm at the National Press Club. It will feature Sampaio, The Intercept's Andrew Fishman, and others, who will discuss the journey to finish the book, the impact it has had so far, and the ongoing threats faced by reporters and other leaders working to protect the Amazon. To reserve your spot, please RSVP at this link. Copies of the book are available for purchase with a ticket online and will also be available for purchase at the event as well. Media Contact:Bill McCarrenwmccarren@ View original content: SOURCE National Press Club Sign in to access your portfolio
The Independent
28-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
A journalist was killed while writing a book on the Amazon. Here's how friends completed his work
After British journalist Dom Phillips was shot and killed while researching an ambitious book on how to protect the world's largest rainforest, friends vowed to finish the project. Three years later, their task is complete. 'How to Save the Amazon,' published Tuesday in Brazil and England ahead of its U.S. release, was pieced together by fellow journalists who immersed themselves in Phillips' notes, outlines and the handful of chapters he'd already written. The resulting book, scheduled to be published in the U.S. on June 10, pairs Phillips' own writing with others' contributions in a powerful examination of the cause for which he gave his life. In addition to the core group who led the work on finishing the book, other colleagues and friends helped to edit chapters, including The Associated Press journalists Fabiano Maisonnave and David Biller. Phillips, who had been a regular contributor to The Guardian newspaper, was taking one of the final reporting trips planned for his book when he was gunned down by fishermen on June 5, 2022, in western Amazon's Javari Valley. Also killed was Bruno Pereira, a Brazilian expert on Indigenous tribes who had made enemies in the region for defending the local communities from intruding fishermen, poachers and illegal gold miners. Their deaths made headlines around the world. Nine people have been indicted in the killings. 'It was just a horrifying, really sad moment. Everybody was trying to think: How can you deal with something like this? And the book was there,' said Jonathan Watts, an Amazon-based environmental writer for The Guardian who coauthored the foreword and one of the chapters. Under the leadership of Phillips' widow, Alessandra Sampaio, a group of five friends agreed to carry the project forward. Along with Watts, the core group also included Andrew Fishman, the Rio-based president of The Intercept Brasil; Phillips' agent, Rebecca Carter; David Davies, a colleague from his days in London as a music journalist; and Tom Hennigan, Latin America correspondent for The Irish Times. 'It was a way to not just feel awful about what had happened, but to get on with something. Especially because so many of Dom's friends are journalists,' Watts said. 'And what you fall back on is what you know best, which is journalism.' Unfinished work researching rainforest solutions By the time of his death, Phillips had traveled extensively across the Amazon and had completed an introduction and nearly four of the 10 planned chapters. He also left behind an outline of the remaining chapters, with different degrees of detail, and many pages of handwritten notes, some of them barely legible. 'I think it's fair to say even Dom didn't yet know what he would do exactly in those chapters,' Watts said. Phillips was searching for hope. He promised his editors a character-driven travel book in which readers would get to know a wide-ranging cast of people living in the area, 'all of whom know and understand the Amazon intimately and have innovative solutions for the millions of people who live there.' The group led by Sampaio selected writers for the remaining chapters, with subjects ranging from a bioeconomy initiative in Brazil's Acre state to global funding for rainforest preservation. Indigenous leader Beto Marubo of the Javari Valley was recruited to co-write an afterword. The team also launched a successful crowdfunding campaign to pay for more reporting trips. Among the group's challenges was ensuring that the book reflected a political shift in Brazil's approach to the Amazon in the years since Phillips' death. Most of Phillips' research was done during the term of right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, as Brazil's Amazon deforestation reached a 15-year high in 2021. The pace of destruction slowed after Bolsonaro's 2022 defeat by leftist leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Fragments of hope, grim statistics Throughout the finished book's more than 300 pages, fragments of hope mix with grim realities. In Chapter 2, 'Cattle Chaos,' Phillips notes that 16% of Brazil's Amazon has already been converted to pasture. Even a farmer who has become a model for successfully increasing productivity without clearing most of his land is criticized for his widespread use of fertilizers. In his chapter on bioeconomy, journalist Jon Lee Anderson visits a reforestation initiative where Benki Piyãko, an Ashaninka leader, promotes environmental restoration coupled with ayahuasca treatment and a fish farm. But the veteran reporter doesn't see how it can be scalable and reproducible given man-made threats and climate change. Later in the chapter, he quotes Marek Hanusch, a German economist for the World Bank, as saying: 'At the end of the day, deforestation is a macroeconomic choice, and so long as Brazil's growth model is based on agriculture, you're going to see expansion into the Amazon.' In the foreword, the group of five organizers state that 'Like Dom, none of us was under any illusion that our writing would save the Amazon, but we could certainly follow his lead in asking the people who might know.' But in this book stained by blood and dim hope, there is another message, according to Watts: 'The most important thing is that this is all about solidarity with our friend and with journalism in general.' ___ The Associated Press' climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at
Associated Press
28-05-2025
- Politics
- Associated Press
A journalist was killed while writing a book on the Amazon. Here's how friends completed his work
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — After British journalist Dom Phillips was shot and killed while researching an ambitious book on how to protect the world's largest rainforest, friends vowed to finish the project. Three years later, their task is complete. 'How to Save the Amazon,' published Tuesday in Brazil and England ahead of its U.S. release, was pieced together by fellow journalists who immersed themselves in Phillips' notes, outlines and the handful of chapters he'd already written. The resulting book, scheduled to be published in the U.S. on June 10, pairs Phillips' own writing with others' contributions in a powerful examination of the cause for which he gave his life. In addition to the core group who led the work on finishing the book, other colleagues and friends helped to edit chapters, including The Associated Press journalists Fabiano Maisonnave and David Biller. Phillips, who had been a regular contributor to The Guardian newspaper, was taking one of the final reporting trips planned for his book when he was gunned down by fishermen on June 5, 2022, in western Amazon's Javari Valley. Also killed was Bruno Pereira, a Brazilian expert on Indigenous tribes who had made enemies in the region for defending the local communities from intruding fishermen, poachers and illegal gold miners. Their deaths made headlines around the world. Nine people have been indicted in the killings. 'It was just a horrifying, really sad moment. Everybody was trying to think: How can you deal with something like this? And the book was there,' said Jonathan Watts, an Amazon-based environmental writer for The Guardian who coauthored the foreword and one of the chapters. Under the leadership of Phillips' widow, Alessandra Sampaio, a group of five friends agreed to carry the project forward. Along with Watts, the core group also included Andrew Fishman, the Rio-based president of The Intercept Brasil; Phillips' agent, Rebecca Carter; David Davies, a colleague from his days in London as a music journalist; and Tom Hennigan, Latin America correspondent for The Irish Times. 'It was a way to not just feel awful about what had happened, but to get on with something. Especially because so many of Dom's friends are journalists,' Watts said. 'And what you fall back on is what you know best, which is journalism.' Unfinished work researching rainforest solutions By the time of his death, Phillips had traveled extensively across the Amazon and had completed an introduction and nearly four of the 10 planned chapters. He also left behind an outline of the remaining chapters, with different degrees of detail, and many pages of handwritten notes, some of them barely legible. 'I think it's fair to say even Dom didn't yet know what he would do exactly in those chapters,' Watts said. Phillips was searching for hope. He promised his editors a character-driven travel book in which readers would get to know a wide-ranging cast of people living in the area, 'all of whom know and understand the Amazon intimately and have innovative solutions for the millions of people who live there.' The group led by Sampaio selected writers for the remaining chapters, with subjects ranging from a bioeconomy initiative in Brazil's Acre state to global funding for rainforest preservation. Indigenous leader Beto Marubo of the Javari Valley was recruited to co-write an afterword. The team also launched a successful crowdfunding campaign to pay for more reporting trips. Among the group's challenges was ensuring that the book reflected a political shift in Brazil's approach to the Amazon in the years since Phillips' death. Most of Phillips' research was done during the term of right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, as Brazil's Amazon deforestation reached a 15-year high in 2021. The pace of destruction slowed after Bolsonaro's 2022 defeat by leftist leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Fragments of hope, grim statistics Throughout the finished book's more than 300 pages, fragments of hope mix with grim realities. In Chapter 2, 'Cattle Chaos,' Phillips notes that 16% of Brazil's Amazon has already been converted to pasture. Even a farmer who has become a model for successfully increasing productivity without clearing most of his land is criticized for his widespread use of fertilizers. In his chapter on bioeconomy, journalist Jon Lee Anderson visits a reforestation initiative where Benki Piyãko, an Ashaninka leader, promotes environmental restoration coupled with ayahuasca treatment and a fish farm. But the veteran reporter doesn't see how it can be scalable and reproducible given man-made threats and climate change. Later in the chapter, he quotes Marek Hanusch, a German economist for the World Bank, as saying: 'At the end of the day, deforestation is a macroeconomic choice, and so long as Brazil's growth model is based on agriculture, you're going to see expansion into the Amazon.' In the foreword, the group of five organizers state that 'Like Dom, none of us was under any illusion that our writing would save the Amazon, but we could certainly follow his lead in asking the people who might know.' But in this book stained by blood and dim hope, there is another message, according to Watts: 'The most important thing is that this is all about solidarity with our friend and with journalism in general.' ___ The Associated Press' climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at
The Guardian
27-05-2025
- The Guardian
‘We carry on with the sadness': new projects honor life and legacy of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira
Three years after the British journalist Dom Phillips and the Brazilian activist Bruno Pereira were murdered in the Amazon, two major new projects will celebrate their lives and work – and the Indigenous communities and rainforests both men sought to protect. Friends of Phillips have completed the book he was writing at the time of his death – How to Save the Amazon – which will be published in the UK, the US and Brazil on 27 May. The book aims to highlight solutions for preserving the world's largest tropical rainforest, focusing primarily on the experiences of its Indigenous peoples and other inhabitants. Phillips had completed less than half of it at the time of his death. 'Finishing it was important to show that Dom and Bruno's voices were not silenced,' said Phillips' widow, Alessandra Sampaio, who oversaw the project. Meanwhile, a new Guardian podcast series, Missing in the Amazon, will be released on 5 June to mark the third anniversary of their murders in the remote Javari valley region. The podcast is the fruit of a three-year investigation by Tom Phillips, the Guardian's Latin American correspondent, who joined the 10-day search for Dom Phillips and Pereira after they vanished in June 2022. 'When discussing the case, everybody talked about the British journalist and the Brazilian Indigenous expert, but I don't know if we ever really found out so much about who these men were,' said Phillips. 'I don't think we ever heard so much from the people who loved them, cared about them and respected them – about who they were, where they came from, why they were doing what they were doing. And that's something that we've tried to make a big part of the podcast,' he added. 'This podcast is about Dom and Bruno – told by the people who knew them best, many of whom are speaking for the first time,' said Nicole Jackson, the Guardian's global head of audio. 'It's also the story of what Dom and Bruno cared so much about: the Amazon and the indigenous people who are trying to protect it. It's about their future and the future of the world's biggest rainforest.' Pereira and Phillips were ambushed and killed near the Amazon town of Atalaia do Norte while returning from a reporting trip to the edge of the Javari valley, one of Brazil's largest Indigenous territories. Soon after the men's remains were found, Sampaio and some of Phillips' closest friends decided to complete his unfinished book. 'Everybody deals with grief differently and, in this case, it was grief mixed with horror and anger,' said Jonathan Watts, the Guardian's global environment editor, who helped plan the project, alongside Sampaio, Phillips' literary agent Rebecca Carter and journalists Andrew Fishman, David Davies and Tom Hennigan. 'Everyone knew that this book had to be finished,' said Fishman, a co-founder of the Intercept Brasil. 'It would be completely unthinkable to let what happened to them be the end of Dom's project.' The first step in the process was understanding how much Phillips had already written. Sampaio handed Fishman a black suitcase that had belonged to her husband, filled with reporter's notebooks, laptops, old mobile phones and external hard drives. 'Dom was extremely organised, but not the greatest at encryption. So it was relatively easy to get all his work together,' he said. Phillips' notes, however, proved more challenging, due to his idiosyncratic handwriting; in the end they had to be 'translated' by one of his sisters, Sian, and an old friend, John Mitchell. Once they were able to review the material, the editorial team concluded that Phillips had completed the introduction and three and a half chapters – and left notes and outlines for another six. The team decided the work should be completed by reporters who had known Dom and were also experts in covering the Amazon, selecting Tom Phillips, the Brazilian reporter Eliane Brum, former Reuters reporter Stuart Grudgings and the New Yorker's Jon Lee Anderson. Indigenous leader Beto Marubo and activist Helena Palmquist wrote the afterword. 'It was an extraordinarily healing and uplifting process to get to know these people – these friends of Dom's who I had had no connection with before,' said Carter, to whom Phillips first pitched the book in 2020. 'We were suddenly very much united by his loss – and also the determination to make this happen.' All of the contributors waived their fees, but to cover the costs of logistically complex reporting trips to the Amazon, the book relied on a fellowship from the Alicia Patterson Foundation (awarded to Phillips in 2021), grants from Whiting Creative and the Fund for Investigative Journalism, a donation from Teresa Bracher, and support from hundreds of crowdfunding backers. Other journalists volunteered to edit the manuscript, and photographers contributed their images to the book. Dozens more supported the project in other ways – from factchecking to helping with outreach and social media. Although it is Phillips' book, Pereira is an essential character. The two men first met in 2018 during a reporting trip to the Javari for the Guardian, and Dom deeply admired Bruno's work. Investigations concluded that the killers had targeted Pereira in retaliation for his efforts to combat illegal fishing – often backed by organised crime – in the Javari valley. The murders took place during the environmentally catastrophic 2019-2023 administration of far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, who was widely criticized for his sluggish response to the disappearances of Phillips and Pereira and called their trip 'an ill-advised adventure'. Since defeating Bolsonaro in the 2022 election, leftist president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has made the Indigenous cause and the Amazon priorities, launching major operations to evict illegal miners from areas such as the Yanomami and Kayapó territories and achieving a major reduction in deforestation. However, Marubo – who was close friends with Pereira and works for the Javari valley Indigenous association – said that despite noticeable improvements since Bolsonaro's departure, Lula's efforts are still falling short: 'You can't fight illegality and the spread of organised crime with two or three isolated operations … We need government action that is continuous and coordinated,' he said. 'Unfortunately, if Dom and Bruno were working here today, they would be killed again,' he said. Three local men were later charged with their murders, while a fourth has been charged with ordering the crime. All are in custody awaiting trial. 'I strongly believe in justice,' said Sampaio, Phillips' widow. 'We hope for things to move more quickly, but my lawyers have told me that the case is progressing as it should,' she said. Sampaio, Marubo and other book contributors have travelled to the UK to take part in launch events at the Hay festival (31 May), in Lancaster (3 June) and in London (5 June). 'It makes me very happy that the book has been completed,' said Sampaio. 'We carry on with the sadness, but we carry on because we must.' How to Save the Amazon: A Journalist's Deadly Quest for Answers is published in the UK, US and Brazil on 27 May. The first two episodes of Missing in the Amazon will be released on 5 June.
