Vanessa Buschschlüter
The number of people known to have been killed in a deadly police raid in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday has risen to 132, officials say.
This is more than double the figure cited after the police operation in the favelas (poor neighbourhoods) of Alemão and Penha, in the north of Rio de Janeiro, on Tuesday.
The public defender’s office, which provides legal assistance to the poor, made the new death toll public after grieving residents lay dozens of bodies in a square early on Wednesday.
The police raid was the deadliest in the city, where authorities have for decades tried to contain the gangs which control many of its poorer neighbourhoods.
Asked about the figure given by the public defender’s office, Rio state Governor Cláudio Castro said that forensic work was still under way and that until it had concluded, the official figure which he had been given was of 58 dead, although it was “certain to change”.
Among those expressing shock about the death toll was Brazil’s President, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
According to Brazil’s justice minister, Lula was “astonished” and also expressed his surprise that the federal government had not been informed beforehand.
Even before the number of dead had more than doubled, the United Nations Human Rights office had said it was “horrified” by the police operation.
Early on Wednesday, residents took the bodies of those killed into a square in Penha, where they placed them next to each other in a long line to show the deadly nature of the raid.
According to Brazilian media, estimates varied between at least 50 and more than 70 bodies.
Many of the bodies had reportedly been retrieved from a nearby hillside, where police said most of the deadly clashes had unfolded.
Challenged by journalists about earlier remarks he had made describing those killed as “criminals”, Governor Castro replied: “To be quite honest with you, the conflict wasn’t in a built-up area, it was all in the woods. So I don’t believe anyone was just strolling in the woods on a day of conflict. And that’s why we can easily classify them.”
Residents described the scenes unfolding on Tuesday as “war-like”, with shoot-outs between officers and armed men – with buses set on fire to create barricades.
According to the police, gang members also used drones to drop explosives on the officers as they fanned out through the neighbourhoods, which are strongholds of the Red Command.
“This is how the Rio police are treated by criminals: with bombs dropped by drones. This is the scale of the challenge we face. This is not ordinary crime, but narco-terrorism,” Governor Castro, said.
Governor Castro said that the raid had been two months in the planning and was based on a thorough investigation.
Among those arrested is a man accused of being a leading drug dealer for the Red Command.
The governor also posted photos on social media of the four police officers who were killed in the operation.
He praised the officers killed on what he called “a historic day” in which he said they “confronted organised crime”.
Rafael Soares, a Brazilian journalist covering crime in Rio, told BBC News Brasil that the Red Command had been on the offensive in Rio in recent years, reclaiming territory it had lost to its rivals, First Capital Command (PCC).
Soares added that the police operation was part of Governor Castro’s efforts to leave his mark and deal a decisive blow to crime in the city ahead of elections next year.
The police raid also comes just days before the city is due to host the C40 World Mayors Summit – a meeting of nearly 100 mayors from the world’s leading cities – and the Earthshot Prize – the environmental award which will be handed out by Prince William on 5 November.
Huge police raids are not unusual in Rio, but the number of fatalities in Tuesday’s operation is.
According to Soares, police operations in which more than 20 people are killed are “very rare” across Brazil and those that do occur, have mainly happened in Rio.
Rio de Janeiro’s Minister for Public Security, Victor Santos, said that 280,000 people lived in the areas where the raids took place.
Police footage showed heavily-armed officers patrolling the narrow, steep lanes of the densely populated hillside favelas.
“This is a war we are seeing in Rio de Janeiro. Decades of inaction by all the institutions – municipal, state and federal – have allowed crime to expand in our territory,” Santos said.
With additional reporting by BBC News Brazil’s Marina Rossi and Mariana Alvim in São Paulo.
Source: bbc.com