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Chief RAONI - Message to the President of the French Republic, François Hollande

Chief RAONI - Message to the President of the French Republic, François Hollande

Chief Raoni and french president François Hollande - Photos © John Van Hasselt

A meeting was planned at the French Pavillon of the Athlets Parc during the UN Summit for sustainable development RIO+20 on the 20th June 2012 between the French President François Hollande and Raoni Metuktire, chief of the kayapo people, symbolic figure of the fight for the preservation of the rainforest and of the people living in this area. The People Summit and the Official Summit were 30 kms away from one another and the area was protected by the forces of law and order. Without escort it was impossible to make it through the traffic jam. As a result, the two men missed eachother by five minutes. Chief Raoni was quite optimistic about the possibility of meeting the French President in a near future and he addressed him this video message

 

This meeting between Raoni METUKTIRE and François Hollande, which was looked forward to and announced by the media, didn’t actually take place in RIO +20 because of enormous traffic jams in the center of RIO de Janeiro which held up the famous Indian chief for several hours.

This missed occasion has only been put back .At least this is the message that Chief Raoni wanted to get through during this short filmed interview for the attention of the President of a friendly country with whom he’d like to have the same kind of priviledged relationship as he had with President François Mitterand and Jaques Chirac that supported him at the time. Raoni reaches out his hand to François Hollande to be invited to France and get to meet him.

Date : 09/08/2012

Author : Gert-Peter BRUCH

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