Brazil

The massacre of more than 100 people in Rio's favelas is an attempt by right-wing governor Claudio Castro to court popularity and revive the fortunes of the far right as they look for a successor to Jair Bolsonaro. It is at once a nod to Trump's military interventionism and a challenge to Lula.

The Amazon is a mirror reflecting the deep contradictions in our approach: development which is a monoculture of thought, authoritarianism disguised as progress, the extractive zeal that devours everything, including the future. The mirrors brought by the Xapiri to Yanomami shamans could help us to see, to listen, and to learn. Will the leaders who are gathering for COP30 in Belém be capable of looking into these mirrors?

Not all the peoples of the Amazon will be represented at the COP, especially the women for whom climate change is no longer a threat, but a daily reality, and from which they are the first to suffer. Indigenous, quilombola and black women from the city periphery all confront obstacles to participate, with no guarantees that they will be heard. Agência Pública’s Cecilia Amorim has spoken to women from each of the three groups

'What The Congress of the Disappeared ultimately shows us is that Brazil is a nation that has never truly reconciled with its past. Now...

Despite the Public Prosecutor’s Office denouncing the practice, the state of São Paulo was still burying identified bodies in anonymous graves in public cemeteries...

Despite the fact that Jair Bolsonaro used digital militias to take down his enemies, propagated fake news on a vast scale and pursued antidemocratic acts against Brazil’s institutions, many Brazilians do not accept that their ex-president is guilty, as the supreme court decided last week. This piece has been republished from The Conversation. You can view the original here.

In the lead-up to the COP30 Climate Summit, which will take place in Belém, Brazil, 10-21 November 2025, LAB joined forces with the NGO...

How to Save The Amazon: This testimony book by the assassinated journalist lays bare the tragedy of Amazônia – of which he himself came to be one of the most painful examples – but also its uniquely marvelous nature.

President Trump has unleashed a barrage of actions against Brazil in an attempt to prevent Lula from retaining support. He has stated his open support for previous president Jair Bolsonaro, now under indictment for inciting a coup against Brazil's democratic institutions. He has named and inveighed against Brazil's judges, notably Alexandre de Moraes. Military threats, disguised as anti-drug aid, may soon follow. Brazil now faces 50 per cent tariffs if they do not bend the knee.

The COP30 climate summit, to be held this year in Belém, the ‘capital’ city of the Brazilian Amazon, comes at a critical moment, providing an opportunity to depart from the path of climate colonialism, end fossil fuel expansion, confront agribusiness and mining, and see the Amazon as a warning, a teacher and a mirror. But it risks becoming a spectacle of exclusion, greenwashing and government ‘performance’.