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residents of a rio Following a major police raid on a notorious drug gang, a de Janeiro favela spent the entire night collecting bodies into trucks and laying them out in a central square.
After which Brazil is being criticized Latest example of excessive use of forceAt least 50 bodies, mostly topless youth, were lying on the ground in Penha on Wednesday morning. Penha was one of two sites targeted in Rio’s deadliest police operation yet.
According to an AP journalist at the scene, hundreds of residents and family members of victims surrounded the bodies, some crying while others yelled “genocide” and later chanted “justice.”
A massive raid by 2,500 police and soldiers using helicopters, armored vehicles and on foot has killed 132 people, including 60 suspected gang members and four policemen, according to officials.
The death toll was more than double that released Tuesday by the Rio public defender’s office, when state officials reported at least 64 people dead, including four police officers. The state government said the raid was targeting a major drug gang.
Rio Governor Claudio Castro said the initial count only counted bodies processed in public morgues.
Several bodies were found in a wooded ridge near the urban community. Local activist Raul Santiago said he was part of a team that found about 15 bodies before dawn.
“We saw people killed: shot in the back, shot in the head, stabbed, people tied up. This level of brutality, the hatred spread – there is no other way to describe it other than genocide,” said Santiago.
Castro said Tuesday that Rio is waging a war against “narco-terrorism,” a term echoing trump Administration in its campaign against drug trafficking in Latin America. Rio’s state government said those killed had protested against police action.
Rio has been the site of deadly police raids for decades. In March 2005, about 29 people were killed in the Baixada Fluminense area of Rio, while in May 2021, 28 people were killed in the Jacarezinho favela.
But the scale and lethality of Tuesday’s operation is unprecedented. Non-governmental organizations and the UN human rights body increasingly expressed concern over the high number of reported deaths and called for an investigation.
The stated objective of the operation was to capture the leaders and limit the territorial expansion of the Red Command criminal gang, which has increased its control over the favela in recent years.
The state government said some 81 suspects were arrested, while 93 rifles and more than half a ton of drugs were seized.
The police raid led to firing and other retaliation by gang members, leading to chaos across the city. schools Affected areas were locked down, a local university canceled classes, and roads were blocked with buses used as barricades.
Gang members reportedly targeted police with at least one drone. The state government of Rio de Janeiro shared a video on Twitter, in which a drone is seen firing from the sky.
Governor Castro, from the conservative opposition liberal PartySaid on Tuesday that Rio was “alone in this war.” Taking a dig at the administration of leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, he said the federal government should provide more assistance to combat crime.
His comments were challenged by the Justice Ministry, which said it had responded to requests from Rio’s state government to deploy national forces in the state, renewing their presence 11 times.
Glacy Hoffman, the Lula administration’s liaison to parliament, agreed that more coordinated action was needed, but pointed to the recent crackdown on money laundering as an example of the federal government’s crackdown on organized crime.
Lula’s chief of staff, Rui Costa, requested an emergency meeting in Rio on Wednesday with local officials and Justice Minister Ricardo Lewandowski.
In recent years criminal gangs have expanded their presence throughout Brazil, including in the Amazon rainforest.
Filipe dos Anjos, secretary general of favela rights organization FAFERJ, said such police operations do not solve the problem because those killed can be easily replaced.
“In about thirty days, organized crime will already be reorganized in the area, doing what it always does: selling drugs, stealing goods, collecting payments and fees,” he said.
“In terms of concrete consequences for the population, for society, such an operation achieves practically nothing,” he said.
Additional reporting by Reuters.