In a report prepared by the Brazilian government with a kind of x-ray of the measures taken by the authorities to combat human rights abuses and comply with international recommendations, the Executive ignored the implications of its policies regarding police brutality and massacres. and operations that resulted in dozens of deaths in 2022 alone.
The absence came within a week when another operation in Vila Cruzeiro left at least 25 dead. Following the deaths, President Jair Bolsonaro used social media to offer congratulations to BOPE fighters “who neutralized at least 20 criminals linked to drug trafficking after they were shot during an operation against criminal group leaders”.
According to data collected by the Center for Violence Studies at the USP (University of São Paulo) and the Brazilian Forum for Public Safety, 5,200 people died as a result of police violence in Brazil in 2017. In 2020, that number rose to 6, 4,000 and last year it remained as high as 6.1 thousand deaths.
The Brazilian state document, which is still in its preliminary version, will be submitted to the UN (United Nations) in August. In November, the party holds a Sabbath with Brazil that examines all aspects of the government’s human rights policy and the challenges facing the country.
This is the Universal Periodic Review, a mechanism created at the UN to analyze whether countries are meeting their international and human rights obligations.
More than a dozen recommendations were made to reduce police violence in the country in 2017, when Brazil was the subject of the most recent hearing. It is therefore up to the government to present next Saturday what the Brazilian state has done to fulfill the proposals adopted five years ago.
The government has announced that a document has already been prepared in 2019, with measures taken in the period between the last review in 2017 and that moment. Therefore, it was only the first months of Jair Bolsonaro’s government.
Now, which will examine the entire period since the last review, the report “gathers the most relevant human rights information from Brazil” regarding recommendations made to the country in 2017.
The new document is still in the preliminary stages and civil society has until 30 June to submit comments. The government has to submit the report to the UN in early August.
“The preparation of an interim report in 2019 has already detailed most of the developments in actions from the beginning of the cycle (2017) to that date, allowing us to update this information here and present any new data that emerges during the period”, Ministry of Women, Family and Human Rights explains the.
Silent to police brutality
However, when it comes to public safety, the 2022 document did not mention any action to reduce police violence.
The text refers only to the “prevention and suppression of terrorism” measures taken since 2019, in addition to the publication of a guide, the laws and resolutions approved to establish guidelines and expert requirements for conducting forensic examinations in cases where there are signs of torture. on preventing and combating torture for a custody hearing.
In 2017, Brazil received more than a dozen recommendations on public safety. One of them openly called for a 10% reduction in deaths from police violence. This should happen through the training of police officers on human rights and the implementation of specific programmes.
In a report submitted by the government in 2019, Brazilian authorities listed several initiatives to reduce violence in the prison system.
The same document cited “human rights education” initiatives in courses given to police officers when accused of police brutality. The text also refers to plans released more than a decade ago, in 2006.
The government also pointed out that human rights procedures are the focal point of the public security system and that there are data collection strategies on police violence so that this can be mapped.
the government has failed
In a parallel report, organizations such as Conectas Human Rights, the New Illegalities Working Group at Fluminense Federal University, the Right to Memory and Racial Justice Initiative, the Black Population Defense Institute, and Justica Global insist that Brazil has failed. To combat police violence between 2017-2022 and to underline that the programs implemented by the state did not bring results.
The document is part of a response expressed by Coletivo RPU Brasil that monitors government compliance with international recommendations.
Overall, the group estimates that “the data is extremely serious and unprecedented in the history of Brazil’s participation in the Review.” About half (46%) of all recommendations exceeded non-compliance and are in regression. By adding the 35% that are constantly pending, we reach a total of 80% of incomplete points. Only 17% of the issues are implemented, but partially implemented, and only one of the 242 recommendations is actually implemented.
legislative recommendations on extrajudicial killings by security forces in the specific case of police brutality; as well as measures to reduce homicide rates and prevent abuse are not “implemented”.
“In Brazil, about 6,000 people die every year due to the intervention of government officials. About 25% of this total number of deaths by police in Brazil is concentrated in the state of Rio de Janeiro. 1,810 people. In short, in a state with a population of about 16 million, more than 327 million people. “In the United States, a country with a large population, it kills police more than four times the total of deaths by all police forces combined,” he says.
For the group, it is also important to highlight that “in 2018, a federal intervention was undertaken in the State of Rio de Janeiro, with the appointment of “military interveners” to command the area of public safety.
“If between 2013 and 2017, police in Rio de Janeiro participated in an average of 15 percent of all homicides in the state, in 2018 – the year of the federal intervention – that number rose to 28 percent in 2019. , police forces were responsible for almost 40% of all deaths”, they emphasize.
The groups also denounced non-compliance with the 2017 recommendations, pointing to “symbolic cases of violations of the right to life by armed agents during on-duty actions, such as the incident known as the Jacarezinho massacre”.
“These violations always occur in a ‘war on drugs’ scenario, but the balance of these operations reveals a real policy of extermination, not public safety or public health related to problem drug use,” they warn.
Institutions also question the effectiveness of police officers’ professional training on human rights. “It seems that a large number of actions implemented in this sense in different Brazilian states are not effective – after all, the scenario of violations continues to grow, as described earlier. They complete educational processes that do not contribute to reducing police deaths or redirecting the actions of public safety experts in accordance with international protocols of action.
The tone used by the government also contradicts the UN assessment. Rapporteurs from the sides criticize Jair Bolsonaro’s government for “failing” in the face of police brutality, demanding a response, condemning the “exponential increase” in operations during the pandemic and warning that Brazil is violating international treaties and even the Universal Declaration of Humanity. Rights.
UN rapporteurs note that in a letter sent to the Brazilian government on 13 December 2021 and obtained by the UOL, they received information about a “systematic” act of police violence.
source: Noticias
