Stop VIolence in Brazil?

Rio de Janeiro

Not long ago a deadly clash between two drug-trafficking gangs caused an escalation of violence in the Morro dos Macacos favela,north of Rio de Janeiro. The fighting lasted several hours and caused 17 death,including two police officers. In light of the seriousness of the situation, this past Sunday, local authorities ordered the deployment of 4,500 additional officers to provide surveillance support in the area.

In Rio's favelas, conflicts of this nature are nothing new, but now that the city is set to host the 2016 Olympic Games, the situation has become newsworthy. Expressions of urban violence - between gangs and police officers or among the gangs themselves - form part of the daily routine in the 900 favelas that sit in the mountains surrounding Rio de Janeiro. This past year alone, in incidents denounced by humanitarian organizations as "police brutality," some 1,100 people were killed on the streets under the charge of "resisting arrest."

These alarming numbers stem from a shattered social fabric in which large swaths of the Brazilian population are mired in poverty, marginalized and denied basic human rights. Despite the significant and sustained economic growth that Brazil has registered in recent years - a development made possible by its vast oil reserves - Brazil continues to rank, according to the latest United Nations Human Development Report, as the country with the greatest measures of inequality in all of Latin America.

In addition to these social factors, rampant and deeply entrenched corruption in Brazil's public institutions is also enabling the violence, particularly with regards to the country's inability to contain the flow of illegal firearms. According to findings by the nongovernmental organization Viva Rio, organized gangs in Brazil are currently in possession of approximately four million illegal weapons.

The above evidence leads to one inescapable conclusion: The solution to the problems of violence and instability that confront Rio de Janeiro - and Brazil in general - cannot be solved with methods that do not address the root causes: poverty, marginalization, inequality and corruption.

Such a task, however, may seem like a tall order for a country in which the conservative elites continue to criminalize, isolate and even wipe out the poor. This line of thinking, which was taken to the extreme with the notorious death squads that murdered poor people and children on the street, seems to have been adopted by the local government of Rio de Janeiro, which, several months ago, set out to build a wall around the favelas, a proposal that has been met with much resistance and charges of discrimination.

In sum, nothing guarantees that the Brazilian authorities can eradicate Rio de Janeiro's problem simply through the construction of walls and the application of police force. These methods can be successful in the short term, and even ensure the realization of a smooth Olympics, but violence will inevitably rear its head again and again if its root causes are not attended to appropriately and completely.

With 2016 Olympics Games hosted in Rio de Janeiro,people are more and more worrying about its safety problems now. You'd better take safety issues into consideration before you go to Brazil in 2014!But I think the country will take more actions because people all over the world are now watching its moves!

Brazil------A Safe Country for an Olympics Games?

Brazil got the chance to hold 2016 Olympics Games not long ago.Now the country has been a target of news all over the world.But I found no good news for the country which is famous for its football and Samba. Its safety problems are more and more worry people in the planet.Maybe Brazilians are worried too.Brazilian government should take more actions now because it's not only for Brazil,but also for countries with a situation like Brazil.You know,some countries like Brazil also want to hold the Games.

But right here I have to list a typical incident that happened in Brazil recently!

Next generation will see India, China, Russia, and Brazil become world's top military powers

India, China, Russia, and Brazil will become the world's richest nations over the next 40 years, as their defense procurement and military budgets soar over the period, offering enormous growth opportunities for diverse defense industries, predicts market researcher Frost & Sullivan in London.

The economies India, China, Russia, and Brazil will develop rapidly, reaching their collective peak by 2050, Frost & Sullivan analysts predict. Defense budgets and procurement in India, China, Russia, and Brazil accounted for 12.6 percent of the total global defense expenditure in 2008 because of their focus onforce modernization, and to counter the persistent threat ofglobal terrorism.

Frost & Sullivan makes these predictions in a report entitled An Executive Analysis of the Defense Budget and Procurement in the BRIC Countries. BRIC stands for Brazil, Russia, India, and China.

These countries account for nearly 13 percent of global defense expenditures, with the United States contributing more than 40 percent and Europe with about 25 percent, Frost & Sullivan says. India, China, Russia, and Brazil hold huge market potential for defense equipment -- especially Brazil and India.

All four countries have nuclear capability and are active in space research. The combined numbers of soldiers in the BRIC countries matches the total number of fighting forces in the rest of the world.

"With massive numbers of troops to maintain, defense budget allocations are naturally high and expected to escalate faster than in the rest of the world," says Harish Balasubramanian a research analysts at Frost & Sullivan. "Modernization and troop upgrades alone will involve mammoth budgets, making these four countries growth hot spots for defense industries."

China beomes Brazil's largest trading partner

China has become Brazil's most-important trading partner, disrupting a relationship between the United States and the Latin country that stretches back to the 1930s.

Welber Barral, the Brazilian trade minister, said total trade between Brazil and China had amounted to $3.2bn (£2.14bn) in April, representing a near twelve-fold increase since 2001.

The sum was greater than the $2.8 billion of imports and exports to the US and represented the second consecutive month that China had topped the trade table.

"It is a historic moment," he said, adding that he expected China to remain in pole position for the rest of the year because its economy is still growing healthily. "China is now a platinum account [for Brazil]," said Douglas Smith, a Latin American economist for Standard Chartered bank.

The US has been Brazil's principal trading partner for nearly 80 years, but a sudden surge in Chinese demand for Brazilian iron ore in the first quarter of this year dislodged the Americans.

The news is the latest sign of China's increasing challenge to US hegemony in Latin America. China has been steadily increasing its sphere of influence and has become particularly close to the four "Red" South American countries: Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru.

China is already Chile's primary trading partner.

In February, China's vice president, Xi Jinping, and its vice prime minister, Hui Liangyu, both travelled through South America to cement ties. They visited nine countries, including Brazil and Mexico,

Venezuela, Ecuador and even Colombia, a staunch US ally. The month before, China contributed $350m to the Inter-American Development Bank.

However, despite much fanfare, China has not signed a bilateral trade agreement with Mercosur, the Latin American free trade bloc. Critics also point out that much of China's foreign investment in Latin America is funnelled directly into offshore tax havens in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda.

Brazil said it now aimed to diversify its range of products to China. Currently the bulk of Brazilian exports is made up of soya beans, for Chinese tofu, iron ore, cellulose and fuel. President Lula is expected to ink further oil and gas deals when he arrives in Beijing for talks on May 18.

"This is a very pressing issue to watch," said Mr Smith. "Brazil is seeking investment from many sources, including China, to help fund exploration from the Santos Basin, which will be very expensive to extract".