Kapuas

In June 2013 police began a surveillance operation, named Operation Kapuas, against an organised crime group smuggling drugs into Scotland.

North of Sintang, a grim commercial town of concrete and rebar at a fork in the Kapuas River, two palm plantations were being developed on peatland bogs.

A longtime supporter of the land rights of indigenous people in Indonesia, Radjawali first got the idea for using drones to protect indigenous communities in 2012, as he traveled down the lengthy Kapuas River in West Kalimantan during a research trip funded by the German government.

The geographer tried to investigate the sites himself during his next trip on the Kapuas in 2013, but both intimidated locals and company officials stayed silent when he attempted to talk to them.

As part of the research team, he’d been tasked with observing the lifestyles of the people who live along the Kapuas, and he was shocked to see hills of red soil on the riverbanks in the heart of traditional Dayak territory, churned up by dubious bauxite mining operations.