The film ‘Dragas: The Obscure Business of Gold in the Amazon’ incorporates a 1-year and 4-month investigation that maps the operations of armed groups and criminal factions exploiting illicit economies in the forest, revealing their locations and modus operandi.

On the second day of navigating the Puruê River in the Amazon, near the border between Brazil and Colombia, the Amazon Underworld project team was approached by armed men who provide security for over a hundred illegal mining dredges. These dredges swallow the river and destroy the forest in the region.

The documentary ‘Dragas: The Obscure Business of Gold in the Amazon’ sheds light on the investigation and the detrimental impact caused by these metallic beasts engaged in illegal gold mining deep within the heart of the rainforest.

To read the article about the river published in the special report, click here.

Amazon Underworld is a joint investigation of InfoAmazonia (Brazil), Armando.Info (Venezuela) and La Liga Contra el Silencio (Colombia). The work is carried out in collaboration with the Pulitzer Center’s Rainforest Investigations Network and financed by the Open Society Foundation, the U.K. Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN NL).