Drug violence casts doubts on Rio de Janeiro Olympics

Oct 20, 2009, 13:53 GMT

Rio de Janeiro - A wave of drug violence that claimed at least 21 lives in Rio de Janeiro this weekend cast major doubts on the prospects of the city that has recently been chosen to host the 2016 Olympics, and on the country that is set to host the 2014 football World Cup.

Rio de Janeiro authorities and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva have long stressed that they can work with the undeniable burden of violence to host the major events.

But doubts resurfaced as clashes between drug gangs and police in the favela, or slum, Morro dos Macacos left 21 people dead just two weeks after Rio was chosen to host the historic first Olympics ever held in South America.

According to Brazil's militarized police, the dead included 15 alleged criminals, three police officers and three civilians unrelated to the drug trade who got stuck in the crossfire.

Lula noted Monday that such violence 'stains the country's image.'

'We are going to do whatever is necessary to clean up the dirt that these people leave across Brazil,' Lula said in a press conference.

The drug gangs Comando Vermelho, Tercer Comando and Amigos dos Amigos have divided Rio slums among themselves, and they know they face a fight if they enter rival territory. Police only venture into some favelas with heavy weapons, since 'soldiers' of the drug gangs patrol streets there with machine guns, even in broad daylight.

For reasons that remained unknown, some members of the Comando Vermelho gang from the favela Morro Sao Joao invaded the rival Morro dos Macacos in the early hours of Saturday, to take a lucrative drug business there from Amigos dos Amigos.

Shooting escalated into a real battle.

Police admitted that they knew of the attack in advance, but they only tried to intervene Saturday morning. Then a police helicopter carrying six officers to the area was brought down. Two officers died immediately when the aircraft exploded, a third died Monday of the wounds - including burns to 80 per cent of his body - he suffered, and another was said to be in serious condition.

Three young people who according to their families were returning home from a party were shot dead in the crossfire, and it was not yet known whether they had been killed by police or by drug dealers.

Buses, cars and tyres were set on fire in several slums.

The Morro dos Macacos is only a few kilometres away from the Maracana stadium, where the Olympic opening and closing ceremonies are set to be held.

Oderlei Santos, spokesman for the Brazilian militarized police, stressed Sunday that the country can guarantee security for the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.

'We have a lot of time left until the World Cup and the Games. By then police will surely have arrested many criminals,' he said confidently.

Rio de Janeiro Governor Sergio Cabral said he was concerned about the drug war, but he guaranteed that police can provide security during the Olympics.

'We are going to continue with our work so that Rio de Janeiro is peaceful before, during and after the Olympic Games,' he stressed.

Cabral insisted that Rio is up to hosting the Games, and that the authorities need time to solve the state's crime problems.

'There no longer exists in Rio that policy of promising to solve security problems in six months,' Cabral said.

Security Minister Jose Mariano Beltrame said that violence affects only a part of the city. And yet northern Rio, the site of the most recent clashes, is less than 2 kilometres away from the Maracana.

This is not the first time that doubts emerge as to Rio de Janeiro's ability to reduce violence for large international events: in the UN's Earth Summit in 1992 and in the 2007 Pan-American Games, large military and police contingents guaranteed security.

For now, police deployed 2,000 extra police officers in Rio Monday, and raids were being carried out in Morro dos Macacos and adjoining slums in an effort to arrest the area's drug boss.

During a raid in the troubled favela on Monday, police seized several weapons including three .30-calibre machine guns. The drug gangs remain heavily armed despite the police operations of recent months.

Cabral stressed Sunday that the city will stand by its policy to combat crime in order to reach the Olympics at peace.

'We told the IOC that it would not be easy, they know that,' he said.