"In Brazil, mining giant Vale is sued over metal contamination found in Indigenous peoples", 25 February 2025.

Brazil’s Federal Prosecutor’s Office is suing the giant mining company Vale, the Brazilian government and the Amazon state of Para over heavy metal contamination in the bodies of Xikrin Indigenous people.

The civil lawsuit, filed Friday and disclosed this week, alleges contamination from Vale’s nickel mining at the Onca-Puma site, with the Catete River carrying mine pollution into Indigenous territory. In 2022, the company and the Xikrin reached an agreement for monthly compensation, but it did not cover health issues, according to the prosecution.

A study by the Federal University of Para, conducted last spring in villages in the Xikrin do Catete Indigenous Territory, found dangerously high levels of heavy metals, including lead, mercury and nickel, in the hair of virtually all the 720 people surveyed...

The Federal Prosecutor’s Office, responsible for protecting Indigenous rights, is demanding that Vale establish a permanent health monitoring program for the community. It also calls on the state of Para, which granted the environmental license, and the federal government, which oversees Indigenous public health policies, to provide technical and administrative support and ensure proper environmental oversight...

In a statement, Vale said experts appointed by a federal court had determined that its operations were not responsible for contaminating the Catete River and that it monitors water quality around its mining sites...

Para’s environmental agency said in a statement that it signed an agreement with Vale in 2024 “to mitigate the socio-environmental impacts of the Onca-Puma nickel mine’s activities.”