The Brazilian government said on Thursday it would send an investigation team to the UK next week after new revelations about the police shooting of a young Brazilian heightened anger over the death.
The government and relatives of Jean Charles de Menezes, who the British had said they thought was a suicide bomber, renewed their condemnation of the police because of press reports which cast doubt on the police account of the shooting.
A Brazilian delegation headed by Deputy Attorney General Wagner Goncalves will travel to London on Monday to speak directly with investigators, the foreign ministry said in a statement.
PHOTO: AP
Wagner will seek more "ample explanations, including in respect to the news recently disclosed by the press" in London, the statement said.
"This news, accompanied by startling images, on the tragic circumstances surrounding the death of Brazilian citizen Jean Charles de Menezes, aggravates the Brazilian government's sense of indignation," the ministry said.
Photographs released in London showed the body of the 27-year-old Brazilian electrician wearing a short jacket while police had said he was wearing a long coat and backpack that led them to think he was a suicide bomber.
"The family and friends are indignant over this confirmation of the [police] lie," Alex Alves Pereira, a cousin of the victim, told O Globo newspaper.
De Menezes was shot dead in Stockwell Underground station in London on July 22, a day after a failed attempt to repeat the London transportation bombings of July 7.
In the city of Gonzaga in Brazil, uncles and cousins said that the dead man's parents did not want to look at the photographs, but could not avoid doing so.
"We asked them not to turn on the radio or the TV but they couldn't resist. They saw the news and they cried a lot. They can't accept it," Alves said.
The Brazilian media has also strongly condemned the UK police.
"The British authorities owe Brazil, and international public opinion, a thorough inquiry into the murder of a peaceful and innocent man," O Globo newspaper said.
"If attitudes like this become the norm, terrorists will have obtained considerable success in their dark plan to destroy Western democracy," Folha de Sao Paulo said.
London Metropolitan Police commissioner Ian Blair said at the time that the shooting was "directly linked" to the inquiry into the suicide bombings and that the victim had ignored police warnings.
Blair is now facing calls to resign, after leaked documents revealed that de Menezes was not wearing a heavy coat that could have concealed a bomb nor was he running to flee the police.
The documents, disclosed on Britain's ITV television, also revealed that de Menezes, who was on his way to work, was restrained by an officer when he was shot seven times in the head, and once in the shoulder, in front of commuters.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
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
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
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