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((Carta Maior photo))

[Translation of an article from Carta Maior for May 13. See original here.]

By Najla Passos

Brasilia – On the 124th anniversary of the Lei Áurea [the law of May 13, 1888, that abolished slavery in Brazil], the commemoration has lost its splendor. Once again, the Chamber of Deputies has postponed a vote on the Proposta de Emenda Constitucional (PEC – Proposal to Amend the Constitution) No. 438, the so-called Slave Labor PEC, which has been in the works in the house for 11 years. The intense mobilization of civil society, the efforts of the administration and the commitment of the more progressive parliamentarians were not enough. It was the ruralista caucus [legislators representing the interests of large landowners], which holds the majority of votes in the house, which had the last word, following the example of what happened with the new Código Florestal [Forest Code]. (more…)

((Carta Maior photo)

[Translation of a column from Carta Maior of São Paulo for March 8. See original here.]

by Emir Sader

The Brazilian right carries within its DNA the 1964 coup and the military dictatorship. At the most decisive moment in Brazilian history to date, when the future of the country was at stake, in the clash between democracy and dictatorship, the right, in all its incarnations – intellectual, journalistic, entrepreneurial, religious – stuck with the dictatorship.

The question of the moment for every public figure, for every institution, every political force, every journalist, every intellectual, every Brazilian, every citizen, is where were they at that crucial moment: defending democracy or supporting the coup and the military dictatorship? (more…)

[Translation of an article by the Spanish news agency Efe as published on February 17 by the Dominican web site Noticias Sin. See original here and related articles here, here, here and here.]

Lima, Perú – The 274 Haitian immigrants stranded in the Peruvian town of Iñapari find themselves among the victims of recent flooding in the area as they try to cross the border illegally into Brazil.

As the local parish priest, René Salízar, told Efe in a telephone conversation on Fiday, the Haitians arrived in Iñapari, in the southeast of the country, after following a route they consider the most economical, with the least migratory procedures to go through to get into Brazil.

The immigrants were evacuated to a college on high ground after spending more than a month in the Iñapari parish church. (more…)

((The 13- and 14-year-old boys. Brasil de Fato photo.))

[Translation of an article from Brasil de Fato for February 8. See original here.]

by Daniel Santini,

Four adolescents were found among the 52 workers rescued from a situation analogous to slavery during an inspection conducted in late January in a rural area of the municipality of Tailândia, Pará, according to the Ministério do Trabalho e Emprego (MTE – Ministry of Labor and Employment). Two of them, who were 13 and 14 years old, were performing dangerous work, handling axes in the extraction and processing of wood, work that is among the worst forms of the exploitation of children, according to the International Labor Organization’s Convention 182 and Brazilian law. Another, who was 16 years old, was working with a scythe to open a path for the transport of logs. And a 15-year-old girl was working as a cook at one of the work sites. Ronaldo de Araújo Costa, owner of the farm where the offenses occurred, denies having exploited slave or child labor, saying that the adolescents were not working but were “opportunists” who happened across the inspection. (more…)

Rousseff selects Eleonora Menicucci to head women’s ministry

[Translation of an article from Carta Maior of São Paulo for Feburary 8. See original here and related articles here and here. Newly appointed head of the Women’s Policy Secretariat, sociologist Eleonora Menicucci, is a former guerrilla fighter who spent time in prison together with President Dilma Rousseff during the military dictatorship. An outspoken feminist, she says she is bisexual and has had two abortions. Brazilian law makes abortion illegal unless the woman’s life is in danger or the pregnancy results from rape. A woman who terminates her pregnancy illegally can be imprisoned for one to three years.]  

By Najla Passos

Brasilia – The feminist movement has celebrated the choice of activist Eleonora Menicucci de Oliveira to head the Secretaria de Políticas para as Mulheres (SPM –Women’s Policy Secretariat). Aware of the limits inherent in leadership by any individual, activists for the cause believe that the new minister, who will assume office on Friday, January 10, will succeed in advancing the controversial debate on the legalization of abortion in Brazil. And they point out many other challenges Eleonora will face as head of the ministry. (more…)

[Translation of an article from AlterPresse Haïti for January 2. See original here and related articles here, here and here.]

Port-au-Prince, February 2 – “We are ready to accept Haitian citizens who would choose to seek new opportunities in Brazil,” Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff told the press during a brief visit to Port-au-Prince on February 1.

Brazil, which desires to be sensitive to Haitian social, economic and humanitarian difficulties, has created a category of permanent visa exclusively for Haitians.

The country can “admit under that type of visa as many as 1,200 Haitian families a year… for a period of five years,” the head of state specified. (more…)

[Translation of a column from the Brazilian web site Carta Maior for January 14. See original here and related articles here and here.]

By Gilberto Maringoni

The administration of the daughter of Bulgarian immigrant Pedro Rousseff, who arrived here in the late 1930s in search of a better life, has just placed restrictions on the entry of immigrants into Brazil.

Last Friday, the National Council on Immigration, an agency tied to the Ministry of Labor, decided that it would halt the annual entry of more than 1,200 Haitians who come to the country in search of better luck. This is a matter of a perverse version of the policy of racial quotas, promoted by several sectors of Brazilian society as a means of providing those of African descent with access to universities and public offices. Now they are quotas to prohibit and not to facilitate. (more…)

((Carla Vaneide - Brasil de Fato photo by Leandro Uchoas))

Construction projects around the World Cup soccer stadium in São Paulo leave a trail of evictions and a lack of public information

[Translation of an article from Brasil de Fato for January 18. See original here. Gilberto Kassab is mayor of São Paulo and Itaquera is a neighborhood in that city.]

by Leandro Uchoas

The history of the 2010 World Cup games in South Africa gives indications that Brazil, as the site of the next edition, does not have much to celebrate. In that African country, with a social reality similar to Brazil’s, the rule was forced evictions with no just compensation, lawless territories created to guarantee profits for Fifa [Fédération Internationale de Football Association], no satisfactory information provided to the public, massive corruption, questionable and over-priced projects, white elephants after the event, violation of environmental laws and human trafficking. All the efforts of government powers lead one to believe that the experience in the land of the Tupinquins [Brazil] will not be very different. A month ago, the Articulação dos Comitês Populares da Copa, made up of representatives of the 12 host cities, released a complete report detailing violations of social and environmental rights. In its geographic scope and the abundance of abuses, the document is impressive. (more…)

((Página/12 photo))

[Translation of an article from Página/12 of Buenos Aires, Argentina, for January 14. See original here.]

By Eric Nepomuceno
In Río de Janeiro

It rains, and it rains hard. In several parts of Minas Gerais, in different regions of the Brazilian southeast and in the mountains neighboring Río, it is only with the help of the gods that one gets through the daily threat of being eliminated because nothing is to be expected from the government.

Exactly one year ago, the summer storms washed away two cities in the neighboring mountainous region – Teresópolis and Nova Friburgo – and caused heavy damage in a third, the most beautiful and important, Petrópolis. The tally of destruction was 918 dead and 215 missing, who surely are dead as well. It was the greatest disaster provoked by climate change ever recorded in Brazil. (more…)

Brazil has issued humanitarian visas to hundreds of Haitians

[Translation of an article by the Spanish news agency Efe as published on January 2 in Listín Diario of Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic. See original here and related article here.]

Some 500 undocumented Haitian immigrants entered the Brazilian city of Brasileia, on the Bolivian border, in the last three days of 2011, joining the approximately 700 who live in an improvised shelter in this Amazonian city of 20,000 inhabitants, official sources reported yesterday.

The immigrants arrived in mass over a few days in the midst of rumors that Brazil is studying the possibility of restricting the entry of Haitians across the Amazonian borders beginning this year, a source in the government of the Brazilian state of Acre told Efe. (more…)

Some argue for open borders

[Translation of an article from the Brazilian website Carta Maior for December 27. See original here.]

by Najla Passos

Brasilia – The Agência Brasileira de Informação and the Polícia Federal are seeking the cooperation of the secret services of other Latin American countries in an attempt to break up the gangs responsible for facilitating the illegal entry of Haitians into the country across the borders with Bolivia and Peru.

“We have to put an end to the trafficking of persons and keep the criminal activity of the  ‘coiotes’ from becoming established in the region,” says Míriam Medeiros da Silva, coodinator general of the Secretaria de Acompanhamento e Estudos Institucionais of the Gabinete de Segurança Institucional of the presidency. (more…)

((Brasil de Fato photo))

[Translation of an article from Brasil de Fato of São Paulo for November 23. See original here.]

By Eduardo Sales de Lima

What after all is the role of the police in society? Considering this year alone, it is striking how actions of the militarized state police have been marked with “excesses.” Police violence has been seen especially in responses to public political demonstrations (taking as an example the Marcha da Maconha [Marijuana March], where journalists were injured by the police), in the troubled relations between the police and inhabitants of poor communities in large Brazilian cities and, more recently, in the evictions from the rector’s building of the University of São Paulo. (more…)