Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Annual Report 2003 - Brazil

Intimidation of members of the Global Justice Centre³⁷

On 11th January 2003, returning from a mission to collect information on summary executions carried out in the State of Paraíba, the research workers of the Global Justice Centre (Centro Justiça Global) found that the flat in which they had been staying had been broken into. Two portable computers as well as research documents had been stolen. Other more valuable goods like a computer, a television set and other office equipment was not taken.

The next day, 12th January 2003, two members of the Centre were making a call from a telephone box when they noticed two suspicious men in a vehicle parked opposite them. Frightened, they fled and the vehicle sped away. In the face of such acts of intimidation, the Global Justice Centre lodged a complaint with Dr. Nilmario Miranda, Human Rights Secretary of the State of Paraíba. He appealed to the government to set up an enquiry into the facts immediately. At the end of 2003, the enquiry had given no results.

These acts of intimidation seem to be linked to enquiries undertaken by the Centre on acts carried out by armed groups in the State of Paraíba, within the framework of a Global Justice general project on summary executions in Brazil. Violent acts against the civil population have increased in the State of Paraíba and the organizations fighting for the conviction of the perpetrators of these violations are particularly exposed to acts of intimidation aimed at deterring them from continuing their enquiries. The Global Justice Centre had already received threats several times because of its work of exposing human rights violations. Hence, on 23rd September 2002, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) had taken measures to protect members of the Global Justice Centre and the member of parliament for the State of Paraíba, Mr. Luis Albuquerque Couto, Itambé municipal councillor, Mr. Manoel Becerra de Mattos and the Prosecutor, Mrs. Rosemary Souto Mayor de Almeida. They had all reported violent acts perpetrated by armed groups in the States of Pernambuco and Paraíba to the Parliamentary enquiry commission on narcotics trafficking.

The trial of those behind the assassination of Mr. João Canuto de Oliveira³⁸

On 22nd and 23rd May 2003, the trial of two large-land owners, Mr. Adilson Carvalho Larandeira, former mayor of Rio Maria, and Mr. Vantuir Gonçalves de Paula, charged with having ordered the assassination of Mr. João Canuto de Oliveira took place. The latter, chairman of the Trade Union of Rio Maria rural workers, State of Pará, and defender of land rights, was assassinated on 18th December 1985. The "Canuto" case is symbolic of the predicament of human rights defenders who are struggling for the cause of peasants in this region of Brazil and who are constantly subject to threats, harassment and violence. In this context, the Observatory sent a judicial observation mission charged with verifying the trial proceedings which attracted great public support. The hearings complied with Brazilian procedural rules and went on without incident. Nonetheless the observers reported restrictions in public access to the court room, especially since hundreds of people had travelled to the capital of the State of Pará to attend the hearings. Some of them had come from 800 kilometres away. The two defendants were sentenced to 19 years and 10 months in prison. However, the judge released them pending possible appeals, invoking the fact that they were first time offenders pursuant to the "Fleury" Act (22nd November 1973). In accordance with the Act, a convicted person who is a first offender may remain free pending appeals. As of the end of December 2003, the appeal was before the appeal judge, Mrs. Albania Lobato Bermerguy, who will hand down a ruling.

The enquiry and the judicial investigation process have lasted for 18 years and have been marked by the disappearance of witnesses, the absconding of persons to be questioned in the enquiry and repeated delays in the procedure. These incidents have been condemned by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). Assassination of trade union leaders and peasants has gone on ever since and there have been some 400 deaths, including Mr. João Canuto.

The Observatory noted with satisfaction that the peoples jury declared the defendants guilty without a shadow of a doubt. However, it expresses its concern at the decision to release the convicted men despite the seriousness of the offences and the length of the sentences, and the risk that they may abscond and new threats be made against some witnesses who are still at risk. Mr. Olinto Vieira enjoys permanent protection while Mr. Sebastiao Vieira has none and is under constant threat.

The position of people who defend the landless is precarious. Their lives are in jeopardy and they come under attacks aimed at discrediting them and bringing their action, which is carried out within a perfectly legal framework, into disrepute.

For instance, in June 2003, the offices of the Redenção Rural Workers Trade Union were ransacked, and important documents, containing inter alia, information on slavery in Brazil, were purloined. This attack took place several months after a similar burglary at the offices of the Landlesss Movement (MST, Movimento dos Sem Terra) in Marabá, when two computers containing many files were stolen. Furthermore, Henri Burin des Roziers, a lawyer, was subject to a slanderous campaign led by the sitting judge of Rio Maria, Roberto Cezar Oliveira Monteiro, because of his work in defence of the landless.

[Refworld note: This report as posted on the FIDH website (www.fidh.org) was in pdf format with country chapters run together by region. Footnote numbers have been retained here, so do not necessarily begin at 1.]

37. See Urgent Appeal BRA 001/0103/0BS 002.

38. See Press Release of 30th May 2003 and the report of the Observatory's judicial observation mission Landless people and their defenders in the State of Pará, May 2003