Brazil safety concerns rise after arrest of police officers and gang rape on bus

Jonathan Watts – The Guardian, 04/02/2013

Brazil‘s efforts to improve public safety ahead of the football World Cup and the Olympics have taken two high-profile hits in recent days with the arrests of eight police officers in São Paulo and news of the rape and robbery of tourists in Rio de Janeiro.

The officers were arrested after a television broadcast showed two teenagers being shot dead on 16 March in the Bras neighbourhood of São Paulo, while the occupants of a nearby patrol car did nothing to help.

One of the victims – a 14 year old known as Piui who collected paper and cardboard from the streets – was shot six times. The other victim, whose name has not been disclosed, was shot 12 times.

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American woman gang-raped and beaten on Brazilian transit van

Simon Romero & Taylor Barnes – The New York Times, 04/01/2013

RIO DE JANEIRO — An American woman was raped by three men aboard a public van in a six-hour abduction over the weekend that began in the seaside district of Copacabana, the police said.

The attackers pummeled the woman’s face and tied up her male companion, a French citizen, then beat him with a metal bar as he witnessed the harrowing assault. The couple were forced to use bank cards to withdraw money from their accounts before the assailants finally freed them at a bus station on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro.

The assault stunned many in Brazil, especially as Rio tries to promote itself as a city on the mend and prepares to host the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games.

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Rio: loser in Brazil’s oil royalty row

Thalita Carrico – The Financial Times, 03/15/2013

The credit ratings agencies have become the latest to weigh into the debate over Brazil’s oil royalties bill, with Fitch warning this week it could lead to a review of the ratings of Rio de Janeiro.

Rarely has a new law inspired so much bitter disagreement between Brazil’s states. The controversy potentially has implications over whether Rio de Janeiro will be able to successfully host the World Cup final next year and the Olympics the following year.

The argument is over how states and municipalities should split their share of revenue from Brazil’s burgeoning offshore oil wealth. The majority of states argue the present regime favours the so-called “producing states”, particularly those near the vast deepwater fields of South-eastern Brazil: Rio de Janeiro, Espírito Santo and São Paulo.

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Brazil: dead fish swamp future Olympic rowing venue

Kristene Quan – Time, 03/17/2013

The lake in Rio de Janeiro where rowers will compete at the 2016 Olympics Games has been filled with an estimated 65 tons of dead fish, according to the Herald Sun.

The water in the Rodrigo de Freitas Lagoon became deoxygenated after storms last week washed “a large amount of organic matter” into the lake, leading to the death of thousands of fish called shad, the Guardian reported.

Rio’s municipal department of the environment launched a two-day emergency clean-up operation with 100 municipal workers to remove the dead fish from the lake, which is located in the heart of the city and a popular tourist attraction, the Daily Mail noted.

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Ocupação no Rio foi considerada a mais tranquila nos quatro anos de UPPs

Diana Brito & Marco Antonio Martins – Folha de São Paulo, 03/04/2013

Em 25 minutos e sem tiros, cerca de 1.500 policiais e 200 fuzileiros navais em 17 blindados da Marinha ocuparam, por volta das 5h de ontem, o complexo de 13 favelas do Caju (na região portuária) e a Barreira do Vasco (na zona norte), abrindo caminho para a instalação de duas novas UPPs (Unidade de Polícia Pacificadora) –a 31ª e a 32ª.

Moradores de favela ocupada no Rio pedem limpeza, escola e calçamento
Prefeitura do Rio fará operação de choque de ordem no Caju
No Rio, UPPs dão sinais de crise com a falta de segurança
Alemão e Penha ainda têm problemas, mas já melhoraram muito, diz Beltrame

A ocupação foi considerada pelos policiais a mais tranquila nos quatro anos de programa das UPPs, num momento em que o Estado encara problemas de corrupção e a volta de traficantes em favelas onde já há unidades.

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Brazil’s Lightning Operation takes Rio shantytowns to ensure Olympic travel route

Fox News Latino, 03/04/2013

A lightning operation conducted without incident by Brazilian security forces  early Sunday morning allowed authorities to regain control of two “favelas,” or  shantytowns, in a strategic part of Rio de Janeiro forming part of the roadway  corridor for the 2016 Olympic Games.

The Complejo do Caju and Barreira do Vasco favela districts, which for  decades had been controlled by drug traffickers, were taken over in half an hour  by some 1,500 members of the security forces, mainly the Bope special operations  battalion and the Shock Battalion of the Military Police, backed up by the local  Civil Police and some 200 navy riflemen.

The riflemen, transported on navy armored vehicles, removed the barricades  and other obstacles that drug traffickers had left along stretches of roadway to  make police access more difficult.

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Brazil: U.S. State Department employee strangled at hotel

The New York Times, 02/28/2013

A vacationing employee of the United States Department of State was found strangled in a Rio de Janeiro hotel, the police said Thursday. The victim was identified as Victoria Tcaciuc, 38, and said she was killed Feb. 20, said Rivaldo Barbosa, chief of the Rio police homicide division. The police have arrested a suspect who is seen in security camera video entering the hotel in Rio’s Copacabana neighborhood, Mr. Barbosa said. The press office of the United States Consulate in Rio said Ms. Tcaciuc was a contract employee of the State Department. Citing privacy act considerations, the consulate did not provide her hometown or other information. The arrested man, identified as Alessandro Rufino Oliveira Carvalho, has acknowledged that he was with Ms. Tcaciuc in the room but denies killing her, Mr. Barbosa said.

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Brazil: The Face Behind Rio’s Carnival

Fox News Latino, 02/07/2013

RIO DE JANEIRO – Rio’s Carnival is here, who do you want to be this year?

The wall of Olga Valles’ office is a vast tableau of famous faces past and present: Barack Obama smiles warmly, while Yasser Arafat poses in his trademark black-and-white keffiyeh. Next to him is George W. Bush, practically cheek-to-cheek with a fierce Saddam Hussein, teeth bared in a snarl under his black beret.

Beyond them are Osama Bin Laden, Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, an array of soccer greats and the more colorful images of Shrek, Simba from the movie “The Lion King” and assorted monsters.

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Brazil unveils official poster for 2014 World Cup

Andrew Downie & Leslie Gevirtz – Reuters, 01/30/2013

Brazil presented the official poster for the 2014 World Cup at a ceremony in Rio de Janeiro on Wednesday, unveiling bright colors and fluid patterns that evoke the tropical nation’s rich flora and fauna.

Designed by the Crama agency, it shows a map of Brazil between two players challenging for a ball.

“The official poster is an important step to showcase Brazil and the FIFA World Cup in the host country and abroad,” said retired soccer star Ronaldo, one of the three members on the World Cup’s local organizing committee.

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Brazil: indigenous squatters living by Rio’s Maracana stadium resist eviction; police close in

AP/The Washington Post, 01/12/2013

Police in riot gear surrounded a settlement of indigenous people next to Rio de Janeiro’s storied Maracana stadium on Saturday, preparing to evict them as soon as an expected court order arrived.

The site commander, police Lt. Alex Melo, explained officers were “waiting for the order, and understand it can come at any time.”

But the order still had not arrived after a tense, daylong standoff. Frightened residents wondered why law enforcement came without an order to enter, and federal public defenders who have worked on the protracted legal battle over the space tried to mediate.

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