In perhaps the most bizarre news you’ll read all week, Brazil’s president Jair Bolsonaro has accused actor and environmental activist Leonardo DiCaprio of financing the Amazon rainforest fires.
On Friday, the president said, “Leonardo DiCaprio, dammit, you’re collaborating with the burning of the Amazon,” during a Facebook live broadcast, adding that the actor was part of an international “campaign against Brazil”, Deadline reports.
He also reportedly told supporters, “This Leonardo DiCaprio’s a cool guy, isn’t he? Giving money for the Amazon to be torched.”
Earth Alliance, an environmental initiative backed by Leo, pledged $US5 million to assist in stopping the fire and preserving Amazon when news of the disaster first broke, so why is Leo’s name now being associated with starting the fires?!
Basically, there were accusations that two nonprofit groups and four volunteer firefighters set fire to part of the forest in an alleged attempt to boost fundraising for an unnamed NGO. However, after investigating the claims, federal prosecutors shut that theory down, saying their investigations pointed to land-grabbers being responsible for fires in the area, rather than nonprofits or firefighters.
Then, Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo, claimed on Twitter that DiCaprio had donated $300,000 to “the NGO that set fire to the Amazon” and accused the conservation group WWF of paying the NGO for photographs of the burning forest.
In a statement to The Associated Press, DiCaprio denied ever giving funding to those two nonprofits, saying, “While worthy of support, we did not fund the organisations targeted. The future of these irreplaceable ecosystems is at stake and I am proud to stand with the groups protecting them.”
