At the least 60 individuals, together with 4 cops, have been killed in a regulation enforcement operation in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in keeping with native media studies.
On Tuesday, the Brazilian information outlet G1 mentioned the loss of life toll had risen to 64, although the federal government has but to formally affirm the quantity.
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The raid, designed to crack down on drug trafficking within the north of the town, has turn into the only most deadly police operations in native historical past.
Officers have defined that the violence was a part of an effort in opposition to drug trafficking and organised crime referred to as Operation Containment.
The gang Comando Vermelho, also called the Purple Command, was named as one of many main targets. The state authorities described the operation as the biggest ever concentrating on the group.
“The operation goals to fight the territorial enlargement of the Comando Vermelho and seize felony leaders from Rio de Janeiro and different states,” Governor Claudio Castro wrote on the social media platform X.
Castro defined that as many as 2,500 officers took half in Tuesday’s police raid, some geared up with armoured autos and helicopters.
The initiative centred on the Alemao and Penha favela complexes — low-income, densely populated neighbourhoods on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro.
Footage that Castro shared on-line confirmed armoured autos patrolling the streets and rows of suspects handcuffed on the bottom.
At the least 56 individuals have been arrested, as authorities sought to serve 250 arrest and search warrants.
However gunfire broke out because the operation was underneath manner, resulting in dozens killed and injured, in addition to highway closures. Preliminary studies point out stray bullets might have struck bystanders.
Comando Vermelho is taken into account the primary drug-trafficking organisation in Rio de Janeiro, and it holds energy in a few of the metropolis’s poorer neighbourhoods.
However different felony organisations have additionally exerted vital sway all through the state.
“ Sixty % of the territory of the state of Rio de Janeiro is both managed by drug gangs or by the militia, which had been formal policemen that determined to cost those who reside within the slums to pay them safety charges,” Al Jazeera correspondent Monica Yanakiew defined.
Within the Eighties, Comando Vermelho emerged as a serious participant within the world cocaine commerce, collaborating with Colombian cartels and traffickers within the Amazon rainforest to distribute illicit narcotics.
Brazil ranks second globally — behind solely america — in gross cocaine consumption.
The nation documented greater than 180,000 incidents involving cocaine trafficking in 2023, ensuing within the seizure of almost 130,000 kilograms (286,600 kilos) of the drug, in keeping with authorities figures.
Police raids in opposition to felony organisations are usually not unusual in Brazil’s favelas, and plenty of flip lethal. In 2024, roughly 700 individuals died throughout police operations in Rio, a price of virtually two a day.
One of many deadliest such raids got here in 2021, when armed police stormed the Jacarezinho favela, killing at least 25 people.
Al Jazeera obtained video and photos on the time that confirmed properties riddled with bullet holes and blood flowing by way of the favela streets.
Such scenes elevate issues about police violence and the efficacy of such raids.
Reporting from Rio de Janeiro, Yanakiew mentioned she had spoken to residents who had been upset by Tuesday’s bloodshed.
“ These are some kinfolk of the those who had been taken right here which are very offended,” she mentioned, gesturing round her. “They are saying that there are some 20 our bodies up the hill, which they will’t take to the hospital.”
Yanakiew added that, with Brazil heading right into a nationwide election in 2026, the specter of felony violence and drug trafficking is predicted to take centre stage.
Incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva introduced final week that he plans to run for re-election within the upcoming race, however he’s set to face sharp criticism from Brazil’s proper wing.
“ The federal government doesn’t need to contemplate these felony gangs as terrorists, as the best in Brazil needs,” Yanakiew defined. “ So that is an ongoing debate now.”
Human rights teams have additionally questioned the timing of such large-scale police operations in Brazil, which aren’t unusual earlier than main worldwide occasions.
Subsequent week, Rio de Janeiro will host the C40 World Mayors Summit and Prince William’s Earthshot Prize, awarded for environmental achievements.
Elsewhere, Brazil is predicted to welcome world leaders for the United Nations local weather summit, COP30, within the Amazonian metropolis of Belem, beginning November 10.
