Sentinel island death free#

He tried to sing to them, but was met with laughter. He offered the tribesmen some fish, exclaiming, “My name is John, I love you and Jesus loves you,” only to be chased away with bows and arrows.

In the days before his final, fateful attempt to reach North Sentinel Island illegally on November 16, he was rebuffed in various ways, according to an extraordinary last letter he sent to his parents. Since 2015, he had visited the Andaman and Nicobar Islands at least four times, which heightened his obsession with the tribe. Unlike an anthropologist, Chau was principally guided by religious faith, leading him to the conviction that the Sentinelese needed saving. He also threatened their way of life: In recent years, given the growing consensus that modern visitors tend to erode the cultures of isolated tribes, the Indian navy has enforced a “no contact” policy with the Sentinelese and other tribes in the area, patrolling the waters to prevent infiltration by anthropologists and adventure-seekers alike. That so few have raised ethical concerns about Chau’s death makes this an extreme case, as if it lies outside any semblance of international law, in some space where only a blunt righteousness prevails-and it is this very quality, perhaps, that makes the story so compelling to audiences around the world.Ĭhau’s very presence on the island posed a danger to the Sentinelese, since they may not have developed immunity to the common microbes he carried with him. “He invited that aggression,” an Indian anthropology professor told the AP. This is how genocides start.Did John Allen Chau, the Christian missionary killed two weeks ago by an indigenous tribe on a remote island in the Indian Ocean, deserve to die? There is the sense that, at the very least, the inhabitants of North Sentinel Island, part of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands located some 700 miles off India’s eastern coast, were justified in meeting Chau’s insistent proselytizing with a hail of arrows. One American commentator noted that the case has angered conservation groups who said such visits endangered the tribe's safety while remarking, 'What better day than Thanksgiving to threaten the lives of indigenous people. Even Indian military personnel and anthropologists seeking to study them have backed down in the face of their desire to remain in isolation. Several US commentators have also pointed out the foolhardiness of Chau’s mission in venturing to an isolated island whose inhabitants are said to have an extant existence of over 30,000 years, and who have chosen not to engage with rest of the world, resulting in even the government of India leaving them alone.

Sentinel island death free#

He ventured out on his own free will and his local contacts need not be persecuted for his own actions,'' they added. We also ask for the release of those friends he had in the Andaman Islands. 'He loved God, life, helping those in need, and had nothing but love for the Sentinelese people.' 'We forgive those reportedly responsible for his death. 'Words cannot express the sadness we have experienced about this report,' his family said in a statement posted on his Instagram account.

But the young adventurer’s family sought to move past the incident that claimed their son’s life. The Trump administration and US lawmakers have so far refrained from commenting on the matter, with the long Thanksgiving weekend giving everyone a respite from the news cycle.