Crime & Violence

The brutal murders of journalist Dom Phillips and indigenist Bruno Pereira took place in a region, the Javari Valley, beset by a profitable vortex of clandestine economies, resource plunder and land grabbing which the present government does almost nothing to discourage or suppress.

Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira were murdered in a remote area of the Amazon – almost certainly by or on the orders of those who run the illegal trade in fish, timber, drugs and minerals. President Bolsonaro has fuelled lawlessness by his rhetoric.

The Javari reserve in Amazonas, where Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira disappeared, is a wild-west border region with multiple problems of drug trafficking, smuggling and land grabbing.

‘Resisto, luego existo’, the new exhibition at Bogota’s Centro de Memoria, Paz y Reconciliacion opens to the public with documentaries about centres of resistance around the country.

It is almost 12 years since the Mexican government ‘declared war on violence’. Since then there have been thousands more homicides and people declared missing. Narcoculture and violence have become normalised in Mexican society. Everyone is affected, but none more so than children, who exhibit more aggressive behaviour and violent play.

Tatiana Huezo's Prayers for the Stolen (Noche de fuego, 2021) is a Mexican drama about female friendship and resilience in the face of violence in Guerrero, Mexico.

The failure to secure justice in cases of gender-based violence shows fundamental flaws in Guatemala’s democratic institutions.

Colombia’s security forces are in retreat. Human rights defenders are in bad shape. These are desperate times in the country. WOLA's Adam Isacson returns from his first visit to Colombia in nearly two years. Here are his reactions.

Whilst Brazil is deemed one of the most violent and dangerous countries in the world, the rate of violent deaths in the country has decreased over recent years. Despite this, women and other gender and sexual minorities remain at greater risk of experiencing violence. 

Alistair Clark reviews Damian Platt's book about organized crime in Rio de Janeiro and asks whether it reflects Brazil more widely.