Resident of Rio's slums tried to go about their business, shaken by four days of deadly gunbattles with drug gangs and attempts by police to bring calm to the sprawling squalid communities. Rio's state governor, meanwhile, asked the federal government for 4,000 army troops to help keep the peace in the shantytowns.
In a letter to the country's justice minister Tuesday, Governor Rosinha Matheus said she would accept soldiers in the shantytowns, but federal officials denied there were any plans to send troops here.
No violence was reported Tuesday in the Rocinha and Vidigal hillside favelas, or shantytowns, where fighting between drug-trafficking gangs has killed at least 10 people, some bystanders, since Friday.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Police reportedly were combing the nearby Atlantic forest for gang members who fled when police stormed into the favelas Monday.
About 1,300 armed police were deployed to keep the peace, but residents said they felt the cease-fire was temporary at best.
"Today it is calm. What about tomorrow?" asked Antonio Trajano, a shantytown shopowner. "These days have been a terrible experience, and people will remain afraid for a long time."
The atmosphere in the shantytown Tuesday was bustling: loudspeakers blared advertising while merchants hawked wares from carts full of fish, meat, cloth and toys.
Residents say the government must invest time and money to keep the peace.
"Ninety-nine percent of the population are honest people, but still there is fear when you cross the sidewalk or a bridge," said William de Oliveira, president of the Rocinha neighborhood association. "What is needed here are long-term policies to boost education, sports and investments that provide jobs."
The war erupted Friday, when a drug gang tried to seize control of the rich drug-selling points on Rocinha's upper hills.
The commando-style invasion set off alarms across Brazil's main resort city, where drug violence rarely disturbs the wealthy neighborhoods.
But Rocinha and Vidigal are just a few hundred yards [meters] from trendy beaches, luxurious hotels and condominiums.
"Drug gangs are almost always fighting for territory," said Rubem Cesar Fernandes, president of the human rights group Viva Rio. "The difference is that this time it happened in slums which are part of the `beautiful' side of Rio."
In Brasilia, federal lawmakers from Rio de Janeiro state met with Justice Minister Marcio Thomaz Bastos to ask the government to intervene in the state.
"There is a clear lack of authority. There is a problem constituted by the difficulty of the governor to fire her security secretary, who has lost control of the situation," Representative Lindberg Farias, of the governing Workers' Party, was quoted as saying by the O Globo news agency.
Rio state security secretary Anthony Garotinho, who is also the governor's husband, proposed that elite troops occupy eight of Rio's most violent slums until 4,000 new police could be trained to take their place.
In a statement, the defense ministry denied media reports that there was an agreement to send troops to Rio. If troops were sent in, the army would decide how and where they would be deployed, the statement said.
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
Packed crowds in India celebrating their cricket team’s victory ended in a deadly stampede on Wednesday, with 11 mainly young fans crushed to death, the local state’s chief minister said. Joyous cricket fans had come out to celebrate and welcome home their heroes, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, after they beat Punjab Kings in a roller-coaster Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket final on Tuesday night. However, the euphoria of the vast crowds in the southern tech city of Bengaluru ended in disaster, with Indian Prime Minister Narendra calling it “absolutely heartrending.” Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said most of the deceased are young, with 11 dead
DENIAL: Musk said that the ‘New York Times was lying their ass off,’ after it reported he used so much drugs that he developed bladder problems Elon Musk on Saturday denied a report that he used ketamine and other drugs extensively last year on the US presidential campaign trail. The New York Times on Friday reported that the billionaire adviser to US President Donald Trump used so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that he developed bladder problems. The newspaper said the world’s richest person also took ecstasy and mushrooms, and traveled with a pill box last year, adding that it was not known whether Musk also took drugs while heading the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) after Trump took power in January. In a
RSS