Claims that a drug-addicted Brazilian woman was forcibly sterilized are sparking accusations of a nightmarish “dystopia” in a nation where a leading presidential candidate has stirred controversy with his own birth control proposals.
The facts of the case not under dispute are that Janaina Aparecida Quirino, an addict with numerous children, had her tubes tied after a ruling by a judge in Mococa.
However, according to a report in Folha de S.Paulo, the woman was homeless and the procedure was performed without her consent.
By the time the judge’s ruling came to appeal at a higher court, “the mutilation had already occurred,” constitutional law professor Oscar Vilhena Vieira said in the report.
“Janaina K. woke under the custody of people she didn’t know, named in a judicial case that she was not informed about,” Institute of Penal Guarantees said.
“It evoked Kafka’s The Trial,” it added, referring to the hallucinatory novel about a man prosecuted without even being told what he is accused of having done.
The judge, Djalma Moreira Gomes, pushed back after Vieira’s article came out last weekend, saying that Quirino, who had seven children with one more on the way, wanted to be sterilized.
“The family set-up was characterized by the parents’ drug dependencies ... physical violence against the children by the current partner and financial difficulties,” the judge said in a statement, also denying that Quirino was ever homeless.
Crucial details of the case, even the dates, remain unclear. The judge’s order was dated October last year, but the sterilization operation had to wait until the woman had given birth a last time.
Prosecutors said she agreed to the operation and some Brazilian media have published a redacted copy of what they say is a consent form signed back in 2015.
However, officials said that a psychologist’s report in which Quirino again gave the green light is under seal and cannot now be verified. In addition, the woman reportedly did not have a lawyer, which, if true, would raise doubts over the validity of anything she signed.
Whatever the truth, Quirino’s story is stirring angry debate. The leftist news site revistaforum.com.br said the incident illustrates the “dystopia of life” in Brazil.
“She was treated as an object, a thing,” the Brazilian Association of Lawyers for Democracy said.
However, not everyone is angry.
Janaina Paschoal, a prominent lawyer famous for her role in the 2016 impeachment of then-Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff, said sterilization was Quirino’s best hope.
“Acknowledging the difficulties around the topic, I declare my support” for the judge, she tweeted. “If I were the judge, I would have decided as he decided. Someone has to look out for the children!”
The debate is unlikely to go away, given that a frontrunner the October presidential election, hard-right former army officer Jair Bolsonaro, has previously called for limiting births among the poor.
“Only birth control can save us from chaos,” the legislator said in 2008, according to Folha de S.Paulo.
Bolsonaro has long campaigned in Congress to loosen laws around sterilization, for example by removing the requirements for the person to be over 25 and to have consent of their spouse.
The military is to begin conscripting civilians next year, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet said yesterday, citing rising tensions with Thailand as the reason for activating a long-dormant mandatory enlistment law. The Cambodian parliament in 2006 approved a law that would require all Cambodians aged 18 to 30 to serve in the military for 18 months, although it has never been enforced. Relations with Thailand have been tense since May, when a long-standing territorial dispute boiled over into cross-border clashes, killing one Cambodian soldier. “This episode of confrontation is a lesson for us and is an opportunity for us to review, assess and
The Russian minister of foreign affairs warned the US, South Korea and Japan against forming a security partnership targeting North Korea as he visited the ally country for talks on further solidifying their booming military and other cooperation. Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov spoke on Saturday in Wonsan City, North Korea, where he met North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un and conveyed greetings from Russian President Vladimir Putin. Kim during the meeting reaffirmed his government’s commitment to “unconditionally support and encourage all measures” taken by Russia in its conflict with Ukraine. Pyongyang and Moscow share identical views on “all strategic issues in
‘FALSE NARRATIVE’: China and the Solomon Islands inked a secretive security pact in 2022, which is believed to be a prelude to building a Chinese base, which Beijing denied The Australian government yesterday said it expects China to spy on major military drills it is conducting with the US and other allies. It also renewed a charge — denounced by Beijing as a “false narrative” — that China wants to establish a military base in the South Pacific. The comments by a government minister came as Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made a six-day visit to China to bolster recently repaired trade ties. More than 30,000 military personnel from 19 nations are set to join in the annual Talisman Sabre exercises from yesterday across Australia and Papua New Guinea. “The Chinese military have
The US Department of Education on Tuesday said it opened a foreign funding investigation into the University of Michigan (UM) while alleging it found “inaccurate and incomplete disclosures” in a review of the university’s foreign reports, after two Chinese scientists linked to the school were separately charged with smuggling biological materials into the US. As part of the investigation, the department asked the university to share, within 30 days, tax records related to foreign funding, a list of foreign gifts, grants and contracts with any foreign source, and other documents, the department said in a statement and in a letter to