SAO PAULO, June 17 (Reuters) – A forensic examination of human stays discovered within the Amazon rainforest confirmed on Friday that they belonged to British journalist Dom Phillips, Brazil’s federal police mentioned, including {that a} suspicious man was being sought. involvement in his homicide.

Work is underway to find out the reason for loss of life, police mentioned in a press release.

The stays of a second individual, believed to be indigenous skilled Bruno Pereira, had been nonetheless underneath evaluation, a CNN Brazil report mentioned on Friday.

Pereira and Phillips disappeared on June 5 within the distant Javari Valley, on the border with Peru and Colombia. Earlier this week, police recovered human stays from a jungle grave the place they had been led by a fisherman, Amarildo da Costa Oliveira, who confessed to killing the 2 males. learn extra

Phillips, a contract reporter who had written for The Guardian and the Washington Publish, was doing analysis for a ebook in regards to the journey with Pereira, a former chief of lately contacted and remoted tribes on the federal Funai indigenous affairs company.

Police mentioned their investigation steered there have been extra individuals concerned moreover Oliveira and that they had been now on the lookout for a person named Jeferson da Silva Lima.

He’s the third suspect named by police after Oliveira and his brother, Oseney da Costa, who was arrested this week.

“There’s an arrest warrant issued by the State Court docket of Atalaia do Norte in opposition to Jeferson da Silva Lima, alias ‘Pelado da Dinha,’ who has not been situated at the moment,” police mentioned.

“The investigations point out that the assassins acted alone, with out bosses or a prison group behind the crime.”

Nevertheless, the native indigenous group Univaja, which performed a distinguished function within the search, mentioned: “The cruelty of the crime makes it clear that Pereira and Phillips crossed paths with a strong prison group that attempted in any respect prices to cowl up their footprints through the investigation. “

He mentioned he had knowledgeable federal police quite a few instances since late 2021 that there was an organized crime group working within the Javari Valley.

INA, a union representing Funai staff, shared that view.

“Everyone knows that the violence within the Javari Valley is linked to a large chain of organized crime,” he mentioned in a separate assertion.

Police mentioned they had been nonetheless trying to find the boat that Phillips and Pereira had been touring in once they had been final seen alive.

US State Division spokesman Ned Worth on Friday referred to as for “accountability and justice” and mentioned that Phillips and Pereira had been killed for supporting the conservation of the rainforest and native peoples.

“Our condolences to the households of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira… We should collectively strengthen efforts to guard environmental defenders and journalists,” Worth mentioned on Twitter.

Reporting by Gabriel Araujo in Sao Paulo, Anthony Boadle in Brasilia, and Carolina Pulice in Mexico Metropolis; Edited by David Alire García, Daniel Wallis and Rosalba O’Brien

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