By Sovereign Hager
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

BRASILIA,Brazil-International human rights groups are vehemently opposing the Brazilian Supreme Court’s decision not to reinterpret a 1979 law giving amnesty to members of the former military government responsible for extrajudicial killings, torture, and rape. Instead, the Court held that such acts were political acts and therefore deserved amnesty.

While Argentine, Bolivia, Chile, Peru, and Uruguay have prosecuted individuals accused of human rights violations during military dictatorships, Brazil has not. Rights groups argue that the amnesty law puts Brazil in breach of conventional and customary international law that does not allow amnesty for crimes of torture and extrajudicial executions.

Tim Cahill of Amnesty International commented that “in a country that sees thousands of extra-judicial killings every year at the hands of security officials and where many more are tortured in police stations and prisons, this ruling clearly signals that in Brazil nobody is held responsible when the state kills and tortures its own citizens.”

Amnesty International also called on Brazil to come into conformity with the rulings of the Inter American Court of Human Rights, which has stressed that ” all amnesty provisions  . . . designed to eliminate responsibility are inadmissible, because they are intended to prevent the investigation and punishment of those responsible for serious human rights violations such as torture, extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary executions, and forced disappearance, all prohibited because they violate rights recognized by international human rights law.”

The Court voted in a 7-2 majority that the law should remain intact because it had been approved by society as a whole, including the bar association, armed forced, and political exiles. Thousands of people were imprisoned, tortured, or disappeared in Brazil under military rule form 1964-1985.

For more information, please see:

Amnesty International-Brazil Court Upholds Law that Protects Torturers-30 April 2010

AP-Brazil’s Top Court-Amnesty Law Will Not Change-30 April 2010

NY TIMES-Brazil: No Change to Amnesty Law-30 April 2010

By Sovereign Hager
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

PARA, Brazil-A court convicted two ranchers for ordering the murder of a U.S. nun and environmental activist, Dorothy Stang in 2005. Prosecutors argued that the two men hired gunmen to kill the seventy-three year old nun because she blocked them from seizing land that the government had given to Amazonian farmers. Both men were sentenced to thirty years in prison.

Dorothy Stang had been working in the Amazon for thirty years to preserve the rainforest and protect the rights of rural workers against large-scale farmers. She was shot and left to die on the side of a muddy rainforest road where loggers and ranchers have deforested large sections of the rainforest.

Human rights groups protested a delay in the prosecution, which was widely viewed as a test of Brazil’s ability to combat impunity in the Amazon region. A court acquitted Vitalmiro Moura in 2008, an event President Lula de Silva called a “stain” on Brazil’s international image. The recent conviction is the result of a retrail. Judge Raimundo Moises Alvez Flexa told the AP that the conviction “sent a clear message that the law will be applied to everyone regardless of socioeconomic status.”

However, both the judge and Greenpeace have stated that more convictions for these types of crimes are necessary in order for activists to truly be protected.  The Pastoral Land Commission estimates that in the past ten years up to 2008, three hundred and sixty-five people were killed  over similar land disputes. Only around eighty gunmen have actually gone to jail for these murders.

Rebeca Spires, a nun who knew Dorothy Stang called the convictions a milestone victory given the “endless supply” of gunmen. Spires told the AP that “the verdict sends a strong message to other masterminds that the impunity is ending.”

For More information, please see:

AP-Brazil: Last Rancher on Trial for U.S. Nun’s Murder-1 May 2010

BBC-Second Brazil Rancher Jailed Over U.S. Nun’s Murder-1 May 2010

Washington Post-Second Brazil Rancher Sentenced in U.S. Nun Murder-1 May 2010

By Sovereign Hager
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

ASUNCION, Paraguay- On Sunday, April 25, 2020, Paraguay’s president signed a bill into law declaring a state of emergency in five of Paraguay’s seventeen provinces. The bill includes a thirty day suspension of constitutional due process guarantees, with an aim to grant the military greater power to combat the Paraguayan People’s Army (PPA). The PPA, an armed leftist group is allegedly responsible for murders, including four police officers.

The bill affects the norther provinces of Concepcion, San Pedro, Amambay, Presidente Hayes and Alto Paraguay and permits officers to arrest any suspected members of the PPA, without warrants. Additionally, there is a ban on public gatherings and protests along with increased controls on the circulation of vehicles on highways and local roads.

The PPA established itself as an armed group after taking responsibility for the September 2004 murder of Cecilia Cubas, a daughter of a former president. Her body was discovered in 2005 after she died in captivity. The group is thought to have roughly one hundred members that operate in remote, inaccessible forested areas, with little access to technology.

Controversy over the bill took center stage when the Vice President Federico Franco declared that the objective of the emergency law is not the elimination of the PPA. It is unclear what Franco was referring to, however, rights groups are also voicing opposition. The Paraguayan Human Rights Coordinating Group (CODEHUPY) stated that the threshold for a state emergency to be declared has not been reached. Specifically, they highlighted the fact that Paraguay is neither involved in an international armed conflict nor facing a situation that could endanger any state institutions in the five affected provinces. CODEHUPY, speaking with IPS, attributed the current situation to “criminals acting outside the law who should be apprehended, charged, and sentenced under the regular legal system.”

CODEHUPY further remarked that if the armed group, they allege contains around ten individuals justifies a state of emergency, then there is a problem with the incapacity of the country’s security agencies. Similarly, a trade union federation, Central Nacional de Trabajadores, pledged to act swiftly in the event there are any violations of the public freedoms established by the constitution.

For more information, please see:

AFP-Paraguay Suspends Rights in Crackdown on Rebel Group-25 April 2010

BBC-Paraguay Suspends Rights in Crackdown on Rebels-24 April 2010

IPS-Paraguay:Controversy Over Troop Deployment-28 April 2010

By Sovereign Hager
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

PARA, Brazil-On April 16, 2010 a judge in the capital, Brasília overturned a ruling halting construction on a dam project to be built in Para State  because it would cause “irreparable harm” to indigenous people. The project, known as the Belo Monte Dam, will involve the excavation of two channels larger than the Panama Canal to divert water from the main dam to the power plant. The reservoir will flood more than one hundred and sixty square miles of forest while drying up a sixty mile stretch of the Xingu River, which will displace more than 20,000 people, many of which are indigenous communities.

Thirteen affected indigenous groups have formed a new tribe of 2,500, which they have stationed directly on the construction site. They plan to occupy it as long as necessary. The chief told the New York Times that they need the river to travel and eat. The groups affected include the Kayapó, Arara, Juruna, Araweté, Xikrin, Asurini, and Parakanã groups. Over eight hundred and fifty people protested what will be the largest dam in the world. Human rights organizations have warned that the dam construction will also bring migrants to the area and threaten uncontacted indigenous people, who have little resistance to outside disease. According to Survival International, many believe that the dam energy will be used to serve the mining industry. A bill is currently before the Brazilian government that would allow mining on indigenous land.

The new ruling allows the auction of bids to take place on April 20, 2010. The Chief of the Arara tribe, José Carolos Arara called the last case “our last cry for help” in a quest to defend their rights after a meeting of thirteen tribes last month, the New York Times reported. Environmentalists have stated that the dams are in fact inefficient and produce less than capacity annually, thus causing fear that the government would still have to build more dams upstream. This would further displace indigenous communities.

The latest ruling found that there was “no imminent danger for the indigenous community” because the auction of bids did not “imply immediate destruction.” The auction, one of numerous stages in the dam project was therefore allowed to go forward as planned. The Brazilian government is trying to meet the growing energy needs of urban areas, constantly requiring new energy projects. The Brazilian government has warned that halting the auction would cause “grave harm” to the economy and could potentially cause Brazil to seek other forms of energy that are more expensive and polluting than the hydroelectric project.

The plans for the dam were developed over thirty years ago before Brazil had constitutional protections for for indigenous peoples. The judge in the recent ruling stated that the Congress would have to pass a law changing the Constitution’s limits on building dams that negatively affect indigenous communities. An appeal to the recent ruling has been filed by Attorney General’s office. Indigenous activists have promised a “river of blood” if the dam project moves forward.

For more information, please see:

Latin American Herald Tribune-Judge’s Ruling Gives Green Light for Massive Brazil Dam-18 April 2010

BBC-Judge Allows Start of Bids on Controversial Dam Project-17 April 2010

Latin America Press-Amazon State Attorney Seeks to Stop Hydroelectric Project-17 April 2010

New York Times-Amazon Dam Project Pits Economic Development Benefit Against Development of Indigenous Lands-16 April 2010

Survival International-Indians and Activists March Against Amazon Mega-Dam-14 April 2010