Sorted by date Results 1 - 11 of 11
AVIGNON, France (AP) — They are, on the face of it, the most ordinary of men. Yet they're all on trial charged with rape. Fathers, grandfathers, husbands, workers and retirees — 50 in all — accused of taking turns on the drugged and inert body of Gisèle Pelicot while her husband recorded the horror for his swelling private video library. The harrowing and unprecedented trial in France is exposing how pornography, chatrooms and men's disdain for or hazy understanding of consent is fueling rape culture. The horror isn't simply that Dominique Peli...
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Two days after Rio de Janeiro city councilwoman Marielle Franco's 2018 assassination, her widow sat down with the chief of the state's civil police, Rivaldo Barbosa, who pledged to do everything in his power to hold the guilty parties to account. In fact, the man Brazilian media once exalted as "Rio's Sherlock" had the exact opposite intent, according to newly revealed allegations. Federal Police arrested Barbosa on March 24 — over six years later — for allegedly helping orchestrate Franco's killing and taking money to ob...
SAO PAULO (AP) — The office of Brazil's vice president says he has become acting president, an indication that President Jair Bolsonaro has left the country and will break tradition by skipping the inauguration Sunday of his political nemesis, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The press office of Bolsonaro's vice president, Gen. Hamilton Mourão, confirmed to journalists he was acting as president. The handoff of power to the vice president occurs whenever Brazil's president travels abroad. The Friday edition of the official gazette said that Bol...
Bocaina de Minas, BRAZIL (AP) — Down a dirt road in the mountains of Minas Gerais, Pelé's home state, Jorge Tavares received the news of the star's death from a 4 a.m. newscast. As a boy, Tavares and his cousins listened to Pelé's World Cup games on the radio. His dazzling performance inspired them to play a game they had never seen, at first using a ball of socks and string. "He leaves a legacy, a person of color who was crowned king of soccer, and he also brought a lot of peace outside Brazil," Tavares, a 67-year-old school-van driver, sai...
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — In the run-up to Brazil's presidential election, many feared a narrow result would spell the death knell for Latin America's largest democracy. So far, however, the worst has been averted, despite a nail-biting victory for former leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva over far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, and ongoing protests by Bolsonaro's supporters across the country. The conservative leader's allies quickly recognized da Silva's victory, the military stayed in the barracks and vigilant world leaders swooped in...
SAO PAULO (AP) — Thousands of Brazilians flocked to a law school Thursday in defense of the nation's democratic institutions, an event that carried echoes of a gathering nearly 45 years ago when citizens joined together at the same site to denounce a brutal military dictatorship. In 1977, the masses poured into the University of Sao Paulo's law school to listen to a reading of "A Letter to Brazilians," a manifesto calling for a prompt return of the rule of law. On Thursday, they heard declarations defending democracy and the country's elections...
CABO FRIO, Brazil (AP) — In April, Brazil's federal police stormed the helipad of a boutique seaside hotel in Rio de Janeiro state, where they busted two men and a woman loading a chopper with 7 million reais ($1.3 million) in neatly packed bills. The detainees told police they worked for G.A.S. Consulting & Technology, a cryptocurrency investment firm founded by a former waiter-turned-multimillionaire who is the central figure in what is alleged to be one of Brazil's biggest-ever pyramid schemes. Police say the company owned by 38-year-old G...
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — In Brazil's bustling Amazon city of Manaus, so many people have died within days in the coronavirus pandemic that coffins had to be stacked on top of each other in long, hastily dug trenches in a city cemetery. Some despairing relatives reluctantly chose cremation for loved ones to avoid burying them in those common graves. Now, with Brazil emerging as Latin America's coronavirus epicenter with more than 6,000 deaths, even the coffins are running out in Manaus. The national funeral home association has pleaded for an u...
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Cases of the new coronavirus are overwhelming hospitals, morgues and cemeteries across Brazil as Latin America's largest nation veers closer to becoming one of the world's pandemic hot spots. Medical officials in Rio de Janeiro and at least four other major cities have warned that their hospital systems are on the verge of collapse, or already too overwhelmed to take any more patients. Health experts expect the number of infections in the country of 211 million people will be much higher than what has been reported b...
PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump would not commit Saturday to continue holding off on hitting Brazil with tariffs on imports of its aluminum and steel, saying "I don't make any promises." Trump commented in the presence of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who Trump was hosting for dinner at his resort home in southern Florida. In a tweet in December, Trump accused Bolsonaro's government of hurting American farmers by manipulating its currency. He pledged to slap tariffs on Brazilian aluminum and steel, but withdrew the t...
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — When Marília de Barros Silva heard reports that the widely popular Brazilian soccer club Flamengo was signing a player for almost 17 million euros ($18.6 million), she felt sadness — but also resentment. For a year, she has been trying in vain to reach a settlement with the Rio de Janeiro club after her teenage son Arthur Vinicius died in a fire that engulfed his dormitory at the team's academy for young players. De Barros Silva says she was incredulous over the amount being paid for the team's new star. She says it dwar...
