A report by the human rights group accuses Rio police of disproportional use of lethal force and of what appear to be extrajudicial executions.
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Campaign group Amnesty global, in a startling revelation on Monday, stated how Brazil’s military police have been responsible for more than 1,500 deaths in the city of Rio de Janeiro in the last five years.
It comes as security officials prepare to cope with the Olympics in a year from this week, when tens of thousands of people will attend the world’s biggest sporting event.
Brazil has more homicides than any other country, with some 56,000 people slain in 2012. More than 50,000 people were murdered in 2012, according to the most recent UN figures. It also stressed that in June, homicides in Rio state dropped to their lowest levels in 24 years.
According to Amnesty International’s research, military police across Rio de Janeiro has regularly used unnecessary and excessive force during security operations in the city’s favelas. However a study of the Acari favela found at least nine out of 10 killings by police in 2014 “strongly suggest the occurence of extrajudicial executions”.
Rio de Janeiro Governor Luiz Fernando Pezao signed a deal Monday with a number of Brazilian universities and analysis institutes to develop a plan for cleansing up the polluted waters of the town’s sewage-strewn Guanabara Bay, the place Olympic crusing occasions will probably be held.
The report, investigating a string of specific cases, reflects the intense violence in many favelas where heavily armed drug dealers and paramilitary police struggle with little regard to the safety of non-combatants.
Amnesty’s report included five recommendations to the state government, which included a call to guarantee independent investigations into all police slayings.
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“In follow, many instances are filed as ‘resistance adopted by demise, ‘ which prevents unbiased investigations and shields the perpetrators from the civilian courts”.
