World Heritage Watch – page 69: Report on Canaima World Heritage Site by SOSOrinoco A gold rush is having a negative impact on Canaima National Park (CNP), a World Heritage Site. Various studies have demonstrated the destruction of at least 521 hectares of its ecosystems It becomes necessary for UNESCO to include CNP on the […]

A year-long journalistic project dedicated to exposing the violence and corruption at the heart of Venezuelan gold production, and its connection to the rest of the world.

This situation report is produced by the International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) and Global Development One (GDO). It focuses on the malaria situation in Venezuela from January 2000 to June 2019, underscoring the role that the complex humanitarian crisis has played in more recent years. www.icaso.org

An in depth article by the Wall Street Journal discusses the content of the report presented by SOSOrinoco to International Union for Conservation of Nature IUCN & UNESCO in July 2018 on the current gold mining situation in Canaima National Park: A World Heritage Site in Venezuela

Illegal mining within the Canaima National Park in #Venezuela, a World Heritage Site designated by @unescowhc.@NicolasMaduro gov’t is responsible for this ecocide. We should raise our voices against this ecocide @UNEnvironment @UN #sosOrinoco

Outdated and destructive mining techniques in Las Claritas Mines and illegal mining is spreading uncontrolled, devastating the environment along the way and increasing malaria to epidemic numbers, toward World Heritage Site Canaima National Park and Imataca National Park

El Parque nacional #Yapacana se localiza en el sector suroeste del #EscudoGuayanés, en la región centro occidental del Estado #Amazonas entre los ríos #Orinoco por el sur y el río #Ventuari al norte y el caño Yagua al oeste.

Downstream from Icabarú, one can see more deforested mining sites along both banks of the Icabarú, and also another settlement with an unpaved landing strip. At the confluence of the Icabarú and Caroní rivers there is a small settlement with a dirt runway for light aircraft, and one can also see mining sites located inside, as well as outside of Canaima National Park. Miners die on a regular basis as a result of being buried alive as flimsy cliffs collapse from the action of pressurized water jets ejected by the monitors used in the hydraulic mining method

The Alto Orinoco – Casiquiare Biosphere Reserve (RBAOC) comprises one of the geographical areas of greatest cultural diversity in the entire Amazon; Indigenous communities of 17 different ethnic groups live there. Each of these peoples is the bearer of a unique cultural heritage, and as a whole they give an extraordinary universe of linguistic diversity, worldviews, mythologies, history, art and ancestral knowledge, which are a true, unique and irreplaceable contribution to Humanity through the conservation of socio-diversity and biodiversity.

Read the report on the resurgence of malaria and the report on the resurgence of vaccine-preventable diseases in Venezuela (measles and diphtheria), affecting the indigenous people in a disproportionate way.

Natural treasures and biodiversity such as these in Amazonas, Venezuela, are under serious threat from the regime of Nicolás Maduro and the mafias that control the regions South of the Orinoco River.

An article by The SOS Orinoco Team