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A man named Tomas Anez Dos Santos was laboring in a tiny open space far in the Peruvian jungle when he heard movements approaching through the thick forest.

He realized he was surrounded, and stood still.

“A single individual positioned, directing using an arrow,” he recalls. “Somehow he became aware of my presence and I started to run.”

He found himself confronting the Mashco Piro tribe. For a long time, Tomas—who lives in the tiny village of Nueva Oceania—served as practically a local to these itinerant people, who avoid contact with foreigners.

A recent document issued by a rights group indicates remain at least 196 described as “uncontacted groups” in existence globally. The Mashco Piro is thought to be the most numerous. The report says half of these tribes could be eliminated in the next decade unless authorities don't do further measures to safeguard them.

It claims the biggest risks stem from deforestation, digging or drilling for oil. Isolated tribes are exceptionally vulnerable to common disease—as such, the report notes a threat is caused by interaction with evangelical missionaries and online personalities looking for attention.

In recent times, Mashco Piro people have been appearing to Nueva Oceania increasingly, based on accounts from residents.

This settlement is a fishermen's village of several households, located high on the shores of the Tauhamanu River in the center of the of Peru jungle, a ten-hour journey from the closest settlement by boat.

The territory is not classified as a preserved zone for remote communities, and deforestation operations function here.

Tomas reports that, on occasion, the noise of logging machinery can be detected day and night, and the tribe members are seeing their forest disrupted and ruined.

In Nueva Oceania, residents say they are torn. They are afraid of the tribal weapons but they hold deep admiration for their “relatives” who live in the forest and want to safeguard them.

“Permit them to live according to their traditions, we are unable to modify their way of life. For this reason we maintain our separation,” says Tomas.

Residents in Nueva Oceania are worried about the destruction to the tribe's survival, the risk of violence and the possibility that timber workers might subject the tribe to illnesses they have no resistance to.

During a visit in the village, the Mashco Piro made themselves known again. Letitia, a resident with a two-year-old girl, was in the forest collecting produce when she noticed them.

“There were calls, sounds from people, numerous of them. Like it was a crowd yelling,” she informed us.

This marked the first time she had met the group and she escaped. Subsequently, her mind was continually pounding from terror.

“As exist loggers and firms destroying the jungle they are escaping, possibly due to terror and they come close to us,” she said. “We don't know how they might react to us. That's what scares me.”

Two years ago, two loggers were assaulted by the group while angling. One was hit by an arrow to the stomach. He recovered, but the second individual was found lifeless days later with nine arrow wounds in his body.

Authorities in Peru follows a strategy of no engagement with secluded communities, rendering it forbidden to commence contact with them.

The policy was first adopted in a nearby nation after decades of lobbying by community representatives, who observed that initial contact with secluded communities resulted to entire communities being wiped out by sickness, destitution and malnutrition.

During the 1980s, when the Nahau tribe in the country made initial contact with the outside world, 50% of their population perished within a few years. A decade later, the Muruhanua people faced the similar destiny.

“Secluded communities are very susceptible—from a disease perspective, any interaction could transmit sicknesses, and even the simplest ones may decimate them,” says an advocate from a Peruvian indigenous rights group. “From a societal perspective, any interaction or intrusion could be highly damaging to their existence and survival as a community.”

For local residents of {