Some 30 Amazon indian leaders are in Washington DC campaigning for the preservation of their rainforest habitat along the Venezuelan/Brazil border, threatened by gold prospectors, lumberjacks, oil companies and "civilization's" diseases.

With them were representatives of the Yanomami -- the last major primitive tribe left in the Amazon -- who say their tribal lands are being invaded by gold miners. Indian leaders from eight (8) Amazon basin nations are lobbying US officials for support to work on a 2-year plan to protect their environment. They are scheduled to have meetings with the US State Department, the World Bank, the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Human Rights Caucus in Congress. A 4-day forum was organized by the Amazon Coalition ofenvironmentalists and human rights workers striving to save the Amazon and its native peoples.

Four years ago, miners reportedly massacred a Yanomami village on the banks of the (Brazilian) Haximu river, killing 16 men, women and children and decapitating some of them with machetes. The Yanomami are living much the same way as they were encountered 500 years ago but their numbers have dwindled to around 9,000 in Brazil and some 11,000 in Venezuela. They've managed to keep their culture intact thanks largely to their isolation, but imported venereal disease, hepatitis, tuberculosis, flu and malaria have decimated the tribe.

"There are an estimated 3,000 miners inside the reserve and the (Brazilian) government has set aside $6 million to expel them. No one knows where the money went ... it just disappeared," says an environmentalist dedicated to defending the Yanomami.