Disputed free-Brazilian

The free-Brazilian Contesté is a disagreement raised between the governments French and Brazilian, on the question of delimitation of the Frontière between Guyana and Brazil. All a vast territory was asserted by the two countries. The protocol of the April 10th 1897, signed between the France and the Brazil, determines in an about precise way the limits of this disputed territory.

It is located enters, in North, Guyanes English and Dutch, the Monts Tumuc-Humac and the Oyapock; in the East, the Atlantic Ocean; in the South, the Araguari until its source (in theory; in practice, since the junction of the course towards North, close to the municipal seat of Oporto Large), and, of this source (or the place previously quoted) a line parallel in the Amazon to Rio Branco; in the West, the Rio Branco (in the current State of Roraima).

The history of the question goes back to the Traité of Utrecht, which says (Article 8):

" That the navigation of the Amazon, as well as two banks of the river, will belong to Portugal, and that the river of Japoc or Vincent Pinson will be used as limit with the two colonies. "

The Japoc river is identified by the Portuguese or the Brazilian ones with Oyapock, and by the French, with Araguari, from where the litigation. This for the limit at the coast.

As regards the interior, the Brazilian ones say that the northern bank of the Amazon means all the northern basin of this river; the French say that the bank alone is Brazilian and that the interior is French.

So that an arbitration became essential to solve a litigation which went back to nearly two hundred years. The Brésil had already offered, in 1856, to divide the territory disputed by taking for limit the river Calçoene. But France refused this division not justified, by maintaining its rights until Araguari.

The territory concerned thus included all the north of the State of the Pará, the North-East of the Amazonas and part of the east of the Roraima. It represented a surface of 550 000 km ² (certain authors speak about only 260 000 km ², 60 000 km ² as a coastal strip and 200 000 km ² inside the grounds).

Facts

At the time of the revolt of Cabanagem (1835 - 1840), the French built a fortification near Amapá, more precisely in a locality bathed by the lake Ramudo. This French garrison was discovered by the Harris captain who, immediately informed the imperial government of it of the Brésil. Dom Pedro II of Bragance was solved then, with its French counterpart Napoleon III, to neutralize the area disputed by the two countries and which correspond to the area now located between the rivers Oiapoque and Araguari.

The zone thus came from there to be named “Disputed free-Brazilian” and to have two representatives: Brazilian living with Belem, and a French residing at Cayenne. The chief town of Disputed was then the small town of Espírito Santo C Amapá, now included in the municipality of Oiapoque. The discovery of Gold in the river Calçoene, in 1894 (certain authors speak about 1893), by the garimpeiros of Pará natives of Curuçá came to awake the greatest interests of France and Brazil for the final possession of the Territory. French side was thus named Trajano Benitez, fugitive Esclave of Cametá, in Pará, which was accepted with Cunani as deputy French (Cunani is today district of Calçoene). In Amapá, it is Eugene Voissien which represented the French interests, and interdisit with Brazilian to reach the gold-fields later, giving rights of creole extraction to only the S of Cayenne.

In Cunani, which had already been by twice the seat of an independent republic (of 1889 with 1902), Trajano practiced repression against them Brésiliens come to settle. It managed from there to tear the Brazilian flag to make float in its place that of France under the agreements of the Marseillaise.

Resistance of the Brazilian ones

With the situation created by Voissien, the inhabitants of Amapá started to react and their first act was to neutralize the rights of the French representative. Thus, joined together the December 26th 1894, the population dislocated Voissien and created a government of Triumvirat, whose canon Domingos Maltez took the presidency, with Francisco Xavier da Veiga Cabral and Desidério Antonio Coelho as advisers. The idea of the Triumvirate came from Coelho which had chosen the 10 of the same month to become the chief of an independent government in Amapá. He proposed a new meeting so that the administration is exerted by three people. The next day was created the Army of defense of Amapá, to try to guarantee the local order. The formation of the government of triumvirate was communicated then to Belem.

In 1895, the canon Domingos Maltez leaves the presidency of the Triumvirate and this one is assumed, in its place, by Cabralzinho. One of the first measurements taken by this one was to reply to a letter signed by the population of Cunani reporting the behavior of Trajano on the spot. Without seeking to practice any inquires, which was the habit in this kind of situation, Cabralzinho sent a garrison to Cunani to stop Trajano. The major Felix Antonio de Souza was in charge of the mission, and made an official proclamation of the Triumvirate to Brazilian of this district.

May 1st, 1895, in the municipality of Amapá, Francisco Xavier da Veiga Cabral, " Cabralzinho" , the French under the command of the Lunier captain pushed back come to release Trajano. This fact most radical of the question of Was disputed Amapá, which is solved only five years later, by the means of the international arbitration.

The French obeyed the orders of the governor of Cayenne, Charvein, which wanted the arrest immediate of Cabralzinho if it would not release the French delegate Trajano, who had been captured by the Army of defense of Amapá, a paramilitary force ordered by Cabralzinho.

Attacks of the French

The May 15th 1895, the adult population was occupied with its daily tasks, either in the center of the city, or with the fields, or dealing of the cattle or the agricultural work. The French went up since early the small Amapá river, on Bengali board the Canonnière, controlled by Brazilian of the name of Evaristo Raimundo. The commander was the lieutenant-captain Lunier and the purpose of the mission was to capture Cabralzinho if it resisted the order to release Trajano. After its arrest, the gendarme S had the role of taking it along to Cayenne. They unloaded and encircled the house of this one, leaving deaths among the population which had resisted.

The requests of the Lunier captain were clearly heard. Vis-a-vis the refusal of Cabralzinho, it was put in position of combat. In little time, the friends of Cabralzinho started to flow, and eighty men of Lunier captain started to fight in an uncontrolled way, following the death of their chief, and worried by the low tide which would cause, with certainty, the stagnation of the boat which had a very high hull.

It is Cabralzinho which seems to have killed Lunier with the gun of a French gendarme. The reaction of Brazilian and the massacre of inhabitants in the city as fast as possible ordered the resolution of the conflict of Disputed. Following long talks, a protocol of arbitration was written on April 10th, 1897, which charged the president with the Swiss Confédération with solving the disagreement.

But the events which have occurred in Amapá had a great international repercussion. In Brazil, the press was spread in protests against the project of the governor of Cayenne to want to make shoot the Brazilian ones taken along as prisoners. The governor himself promised a reward of a million francs for any person who would capture alive Cabralzinho.

The diplomatic relations between Brazil and France were with lowest and required a reformulation. The French government recognized the responsibility for Mr. Charvein for the massacre which has occurred on May 15th, 1895. Its distance of Cayenne was immediate, being worth to him, like " récompense" , an obligatory retirement. But the French press persisted in declaring Cabralzinho guilty.

The facts were definitively solved with the Swiss judgment giving win to Brazil and whose conclusions were announced on February 1st 1900, by the President Suisse, Walter Hauser:

1 - The Japoc river or Vincent-Finch of article 8 of the treaty of Utrecht is Oyapock which emerges in the west of the Orange course as it is established by the documents that Brazil subjected to the court, and the talweg of this river since its mouth until its source will constitute definitively the first of the lines borders between Brazil and the French Guiana
2 - The other line border, since the source of Oyapock up to the point of meeting with the Dutch territory, will be that which article 2 of the treaty of arbitration indicates as intermediate solution: i.e. the watershed on the Tamuc-Humac mounts forming the septentrional limit of the basin of the Amazon.

Today

Nowadays, some Guianese irredentists assert a free State of Counani (Cunani, is the Portuguese C-W communication). It has its flag.

See too

Republic independent of Guyana

References

the disputed free-Brazilian one, P. Vidal of Blache, Annals of Geography, Volume 10, Number 49, p. 68 - 70 (1901).
Yearly of hygiene and colonial medicine, Divides into volumes fourth (1901), on the sanitary situation of Counani, pp. 121 to 128: p. 121, p. 122, p. 123, p. 124 (with a chart of overall picture of the territorial claim), p. 125, p. 126, p. 127, p. 128.
the free State of Counani or the expression of independent Guyana.
Le Figaro of December 2nd, 1900 (number 336) on the site of the BNF (of the bottom of the 3rd column to the top of 4th).

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