Brazil space institute director sacked in Amazon deforestation row
Source: The Guardian
Brazil space institute director sacked in Amazon deforestation row
Far-right leader Jair Bolsonaro calls satellite data showing rise in deforestation ‘lies’
Dominic Phillips in Rio de Janeiro
Fri 2 Aug 2019 19.11 BST Last modified on Fri 2 Aug 2019 20.22 BST
The director of Brazil’s National Space Research Institute (INPE) has been sacked in the midst of a controversy over its satellite data showing a rise in Amazon deforestation, which the far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, has called “lies”.
Ricardo Galvão, who had defended the institute and criticised Bolsonaro’s attack, was dismissed on Friday after a meeting with the science and technology minister, Marcos Pontes.
“The way I expressed myself in relation to the president has caused an unsustainable embarrassment,” Galvão said on Friday morning, according to the Folha de S Paulo newspaper site.
“Sacking the director of INPE is just an act of vengeance against someone who showed the truth,” said Greenpeace Brasil’s public policy coordinator, Márcio Astrini, in a statement.
Available on a government website, data from the Deter satellite showed an alarming rise in deforestation in recent months: it soared 88% in June compared with a year earlier.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/02/brazil-space-institute-director-sacked-in-amazon-deforestation-row
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I'm never surprised by this sort of news any more. Nothing serious will be done. Might as well get used to it. 