In the last two weeks the Brazilian scholar Matias Spektor of the Fundação Getúlio Vargas has brought to light documents which take us back to the dark depths of the country’s military regime which governed from 1964 to 1984.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MaiFvx6lNSU
Matias Spektor comments on the discovery of the CIA documents. Interview by Pedro Bial, Video: Fatos Incríveis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2mP3XbFZPY
Jair Bolsonaro defends Reserve General...
The imprisonment of former president Lula takes place against a background which is complicated at best and murky at worst.
The case against him is as follows: Lula’s wife, who died two years ago, had been eligible to purchase a $0.5 million duplex apartment in the seaside resort of Guarujá in São Paulo state, but subject to paying for an upgrade...
São Paulo, 16 April. Lula disappeared into the federal police building in Curitiba on 7 April and nobody knows when he will be seen again.
Two days before, after the Supreme Court refused to grant him a habeas corpus, the PT’s presidential candidate had bunkered down at the HQ of the metalworkers union in São Bernardo, surrounded by thousands of...
In a decision as closely watched as a World Cup final, Brazil’s Supreme Court decided by 6 to 5 to reject a habeas corpus application for ex-president Lula, opening the way for his imminent arrest. The eleven judges spent 11 hours proffering their votes in erudite, legal language peppered with Latin expressions, impossible for the man or woman in...
22 March 2018. Marielle Franco was executed with four bullets. One each for racism, misogyny, homophobia and impunity.
By killing Marielle, the assassins eliminated not just a politician elected on the PSOL ticket to the Rio City Council with 46,000 votes, a lone black woman in the sea of white, male, wealthy politicians. They also silenced the voice of a...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIhSvU6trWs
Video: The intercept
The murder on 14 March of Marielle Franco, a young black city councillor and human rights campaigner, has deeply traumatized Rio de Janeiro, a city so cheated by the failure of mega-events such as the World Cup and Olympics to deliver lasting social change, and so bitterly accustomed to violence.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HN-JjAX_zdw
Political colleagues and family members speak out about...
Little did she know that she would be the next victim when Marielle Franco, a left-wing city councillor, penned her last twitter post, denouncing the killing of yet another young black man in the favelas of Rio. “Another homicide of a young man that can be credited to the police. Matheus Melo was leaving church when he was killed....
Norsk Hydro’s Alunorte aluminum refining facility in Barcarena municipality, Pará state, has been accused by Brazilian authorities of contaminating the local waters of several communities with toxic waste that overflowed earlier this month from a holding basin.
The firm denied the allegation, but has agreed to provide water to local residents, and is investigating.
The government also accused...
Local leaders in Barcarena, Pará are in fear for their lives, following the murder on Monday 12 March of one of their leaders, 47 year-old Paulo Sérgio Almeida Nascimento. This was the second murder of a community leader in three months. Fernando Pereira was murdered on 22 December 2017.
“It’s as though we are the prey and they are the...
Since 16 February an army general has been in charge of policing and security in the state of Rio de Janeiro. This is the effect of a surprise decree issued by President Michel Temer, since approved by both chambers of the Brazilian Congress. This is the first time since the end of the military dictatorship in 1985 that power...