A police raid in a low-income neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro set off a gunbattle that killed nine people and wounded two officers Wednesday, marking the latest incident in a wave of lethal policing in Brazil. In a statement, Rio's police said suspected criminals in the Vila Cruzeiro favela shot first, wounding the officers and prompting police to return fire. Nine people hit by bullets were taken to a state hospital, where they were declared dead, according to the statement, which said intelligence work had uncovered a meeting in Vila Cruzeiro among crime leaders who control the region. Condemned building used by homeless people falls in Brazil, killing 14 people Vila Cruzeiro has been the site of bloodshed during police operations in the past. A firefight in resulted in more than 20 deaths in May 2022, just months after another raid saw eight people killed. The Rio de Janeiro state government’s strategy for tackling violence and organized crime has come under criticism in recent years, particularly given there is little insight into officers' choice to dispense lethal force. The practice isn't limited to Rio. The raid Wednesday morning came as the public security secretariat in neighboring Sao Paulo state raised the death toll from a police operation there the previous day to 16 from 14. The prior figure had already meant the raid in the coastal city of Guaruja was that state's deadliest since 2006, according to news website G1. Guaruja residents protested against police Wednesday, holding banners and walking amid large, stuffed dolls strewn on the ground in representation of the dead. In Lula's first six months, Brazil Amazon deforestation dropped 34%, reversing trend under Bolsonaro Over the weekend, three police operations targeting alleged drug traffickers in the northeastern state of Bahia resulted in 19 people being killed, local media reported. Outcry over the unbridled lethality of policing in Brazil's favelas has led to the adoption of police body cameras in certain states, notably Sao Paulo. The cameras have been widely credited with reducing police violence there. Neymar’s publicity representative Robin Miah meets Brazilian envoy in Dhaka Killings by active-duty officers in Sao Paulo fell to 256 in 2022, down 61% from 2020 — the last full year before the widespread rollout of the cameras.

Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s central office at Nayapaltan in Dhaka was reopened on Sunday noon, four days after closure following police raid at the office. Some BNP leaders led by party organising secretary and acting secretary Syed Emran Saleh Prince went to the BNP office around 1pm and entered the office with some lawyers and journalists around 1:15pm. Later they inspected the whole office. Read more: Fakhrul, Abbas, 5 other BNP leaders seek bail, hearing tomorrow Talking to the reporters, Emran Saleh said the police vandalized the furniture and valuables of the office. They also seized the office computers and other equipment. “We will prepare a list of the losses made at the office by the police,” he added. He also asked the lawyers, journalists and party leaders and activists to enter the office carefully as pieces of glasses were scattered everywhere at the office due to the vandalism.

Police targeting drug traffickers raided a slum in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday and at least one officer and two dozen others died after being shot, authorities said. The civil police’s press office confirmed the death of the cop and 24 alleged “criminals” in a message to the Associated Press. A police helicopter flew low over the Jacarezinho favela as heavily armed men fled police by leaping from roof to roof, according to images shown on local television. Also read: Grim list of deaths at police hands grows even after verdict One woman told The Associated Press she saw police kill a badly wounded man she described as helpless and unarmed who they found after he had fled into her house. Felipe Curi, a detective in Rio’s civil police, denied there had been any executions. “There were no suspects killed. They were all traffickers or criminals who tried to take the lives of our police officers and there was no other alternative,” he said during a press conference. Police had to struggle to enter the favela because of concrete barriers built by the criminals, according to the detective. Shooting spread throughout the community. During the operation, several people Curi described as criminals invaded neighboring houses trying to hide. Six were arrested, he said. The police also seized 16 pistols, six rifles, a submachine gun, 12 grenades and a shotgun. Service on a subway line was temporarily suspended “due to intense shooting in the region,” according to a statement from the company that operates it. Earlier, two subway passengers were injured when a stray bullet shattered the glass of one car. Jacarezinho, one of the city’s most populous favelas, with some 40,000 residents, is dominated by the Comando Vermelho, one of Brazil’s leading criminal organizations. The police consider Jacarezinho to be one of the group’s headquarters. Thursday’s operation was aimed at investigating the recruitment of teenagers to hijack trains and commit other crimes, police said in a statement. Also read: 1 verdict, then 6 police killings across America in 24 hours A group of about 50 residents in Jacarezinho poured into a narrow street on Thursday afternoon to follow members of the state legislature’s human rights commission as it conducted an inspection. They shouted “justice” while clapping their hands and some raised their right fists into the air. Human Rights Watch Brazil said in a statement that the public prosecutor must immediately investigate possible police abuses. The police statement said the criminal gang has a “warlike structure of soldiers equipped with rifles, grenades, bulletproof vests, pistols, camouflaged clothing and other military accessories.” The Candido Mendes University’s Public Safety Observatory said that at least 12 police operations in Rio state this year have resulted in three or more deaths. Observatory director Silvia Ramos said Thursday’s raid was among the deadliest in the city’s recent history. Many of them appear to violate a ruling by Brazil’s Supreme Court last year that ordered the police to suspend operations during the pandemic, restricting them to “absolutely exceptional” situations. The Supreme Court declined to comment when asked by The Associated Press if Thursday’s operation would qualify. Rio police killed an average of more than five people a day during the first quarter of 2021, the most lethal start of a year since the state government began regularly releasing such data more than two decades ago, according to the Observatory.

A court here on Thursday fixed March 2 to pass an order on charge framing against 10 ‘militants’ in a case filed over a police raid at Kalyanpur that had killed nine suspected militants on July 25, 2016.

Four policemen were injured in a ‘gunfight’ with robbers when the law enforcers raided a weapons factory in the remote hills of Raozan upazila on Wednesday morning.