Murders of Brazil land defenders double in 2025: NGO

The number of environmental and land activists murdered or disappeared in Brazil in 2025 more than doubled to 26, the advocacy group Global Witness said Tuesday.

Brazil was the world's second-most dangerous country for environmental defenders after Colombia, where 39 activists were murdered last year, according to Global Witness.

The two Amazonian countries accounted for 52 percent of the 124 murders of environmental defenders worldwide last year, down from 146 in 2024.

Honduras and the Philippines tied for third deadliest country with 12 murders each, followed by Mexico with 10.

Land disputes are believed to have been the trigger for over half the killings.

A majority of the murders -- 85 percent -- took place In Latin America.

Carlos Lima, of Brazil's Pastoral Land Commission, an organization that defends the rights of small-scale farmers and Indigenous people in Brazil, told AFP that there was "almost a license to kill" land activists in his homeland.

Colombia was ranked the most violent country in the world for activists for the fourth straight year.

Drug cartels, guerrilla groups and paramilitaries in Colombia vie for control of the production and trafficking of cocaine as well as the highly lucrative illegal gold mining trade.

Global Witness said that more than one third of all activists' killings were linked to organized crime or hitmen.

"Defenders are the world's eyes and ears on the ground. It's thanks to them that we know when ecosystems are being destroyed, where forests are being cleared or rivers polluted," the lead author of the report, Toby Hill, noted.