Paiakan, 66, died in a hospital in Redenção, southern Pará, a state where the coronavirus epidemic spread among indigenous communities and killed several tribal elders, according to CNN Brasil.
Paiakan was known for drawing attention to the cost of building the Belo Monte hydroelectric plant on the Xingu River in the Amazon in the 1980s.
"His legacy leaves a lot of strength in the history and life of peoples. Recognized internationally as a great defender of the forest and its peoples, Paiakan has been an inspiration in the struggle for all of us," said APIB in a press release. declaration.
The natives of Brazil are dying at an alarming rate from Covid-19. The death rate is double that of the rest of the Brazilian population, according to APIB, which tracks the number of cases and deaths among the country's 900,000 indigenous people.
By the end of May, the APIB had recorded more than 980 officially confirmed coronavirus cases and at least 125 deaths among the indigenous population, suggesting a mortality rate of 12.6% - compared to a national rate of 6 , 4%.
And the pandemic has not affected the disturbing rate of forest loss in the Amazon.
Deforestation in the Brazilian rainforest increased by almost 64% in April this year, compared to the same month last year, according to data from the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE).
In April alone, more than 156 square miles (405.6 square kilometers) of rainforest was destroyed - a large swath more than double the size of Washington, DC.
The first quarter of 2020 had already seen an increase of more than 50% in deforestation compared to last year, according to data from the INPE.
