The Jacarezinho favela, with its 37,000 official residents, is the second largest slum in Rio de Janeiro. And in addition to being considered the most “black”, it is also reputed to be one of the most violent in Brazil. The base from which it operates the infamous Vermelho Command, the most powerful cartel of Brazilian drug trafficking. But what happened Thursday at dawn in the alleys and poor houses of the favela, says those who live there, had never been seen before. The operation launched by the police, following a complaint for alleged solicitation of minors forced to carry out murders and thefts, ended with at least 25 deaths, including an officer shot in the head. Two passengers from the subway crossing the favela were also injured in the raid, hit by stray bullets.
The denunciation of the UN High Commissioner
The numbers, in this case, matter. Out of a total of 21 arrest warrants, only three would have been carried out, the others wanted would have died or escaped. Some videos show heavily armed men fleeing over the rooftops. But there are also several images of corpses in houses and on the street. In one photo, policemen take away a body wrapped in a white sheet, thus erasing substantial evidence for the judicial investigation into the tragic outcome of the operation, requested yesterday by many Brazilian opposition politicians and the UN High Commissioner for human rights who said he was “deeply troubled by the killings”. And yesterday a protest rally gathered hundreds of people in Jacarezinho.
Nine hours of terror
For about nine hours, the favela was locked in terror. Schools and Covid vaccination centers closed, residents barricaded themselves in homes. According to some witnesses, the carnage would have started, in retaliation, after the killing of the agent. The policemen would have shot unarmed men without even giving them time to surrender, “real executions”, denounced an inhabitant of the favela.
“The biggest massacre in Rio”
“It is the largest massacre ever committed by police officers in the city of Rio de Janeiro,” denounced Amnesty International. “The Brazilian Federal Supreme Court suspended police operations in the slums of Rio de Janeiro on June 5, 2020, but the governor of Rio (Claudio Castro, faithful ally of President Jair Bolsonaro, ed) has systematically failed to comply with this decision and operations have not stopped. It is completely unacceptable that the security forces continue to commit serious human rights violations against the residents of the favelas, who are mostly black and live in poverty. “
“They recruited children of workers”
For its part, the police reject the accusation of having wanted to carry out a massacre for revenge: «We do not act out of emotion. It was a very well planned operation, which respected all protocols and was the result of ten months of investigation, ”said Commissioner Rodrigo Oliveira. “The criminals recruited the children of the workers and even forbade them the right to have romantic relationships.” The description of the Vermelho Command follows: «a warlike structure of soldiers equipped with rifles, grenades, bulletproof vests».
Lula’s accusation of Bolsonaro
Bolsonaro has not yet commented on the operation. Instead, the former president Lula da Silva denounced the gratuitous violence of the police: «An operation with dozens of deaths cannot be qualified as a public security operation. It is proof of the absence of a government that offers education and work, which is the cause of a great deal of violence, ”said da Silva, who will most likely challenge Bolsonaro to next year’s presidential elections after his corruption sentences are lifted.
May 7, 2021 (change May 7, 2021 | 19:19)
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