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Bolsonaro pardon includes Brazilian officers convicted in prison massacre

Photo: TÉRCIO TEIXEIRA / AFP

| By AFP |

Outgoing Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has pardoned security forces convicted of crimes committed more than 30 years ago, which legal experts say applies to agents found guilty of an infamous prison massacre in 1992.

The far-right leader’s decree, which is part of a traditional Christmas pardoning and comes nine days before he leaves office, gives a pass to officers whose crimes “were not considered extremely serious” and were committed in the line of duty more than three decades ago, an official document said. 

The measure would, therefore, pardon 74 police officers convicted in the massacre at Sao Paulo’s Carandiru prison on October 2, 1992, when 111 detainees were killed in a military police intervention to control a riot, according to specialists.

While prosecutors said the prisoners were executed, the defense maintained that members of the military police were acting in self-defense.

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Carandiru prison was closed following the episode.

Although the agents were tried and sentenced, they have so far lived free thanks to multiple appeals, according to the Brazilian press.

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International

Six killed, including baby, in armed attack near tourist beach in Ecuador

Six people, including a baby girl about two years old, were killed on Sunday in an armed attack near a tourist beach in southwestern Ecuador, police said. The shooting, carried out with rifles, also left three people wounded.

The incident took place in the coastal town of Puerto López, in the province of Manabí, a popular tourist destination known for whale watching. The attack occurred amid a surge of violence over the weekend that left at least nine people dead nationwide, according to local media reports.

“There are six fatalities and three injured,” Colonel William Acurio, the local police commander, told reporters on Sunday. He confirmed that one of the victims was a baby “approximately two years old.”

Authorities have not released further details about the motive behind the attack or whether arrests have been made.

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International

Man accused of killing nine in Paramaribo dies by suicide in police custody

The man who killed nine people, including five children, on Saturday night in Paramaribo died by suicide while in custody, Suriname police confirmed in a statement on Monday.

The suspect, identified by the initials D.A., 43, “hanged himself inside a holding cell at the Keizerstraat police station” in the capital, Paramaribo, according to the official report.

Police said the man sustained leg injuries during his arrest and was taken to a hospital before being transferred to the detention facility on Sunday night. Authorities did not provide further details on the circumstances surrounding his death.

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International

Winter storm disrupts holiday travel, forcing 1,500 flight cancellations in the U.S.

Airlines canceled around 1,500 flights across the United States during the peak Christmas travel season after warnings of a severe winter storm and forecasts of heavy snowfall in the Midwest and Northeast. An additional 5,900 flights were delayed due to adverse weather conditions.

More than 40 million Americans were under snowstorm warnings or weather advisories one day after Christmas. Meanwhile, another 30 million people faced flood or storm alerts in California, where an atmospheric river triggered intense rainfall.

New York City was bracing for up to 25 centimeters (10 inches) of snow overnight, which would mark its heaviest snowfall in four years. Cold weather was expected to persist through the weekend in the nation’s largest city. According to flight-tracking website FlightAware, airports in the New York area recorded about 850 flight cancellations.

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