Brazil

RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug. 27 (Xinhua) -- Brazil on Monday turned down aid from the Group of Seven (G7) member states to fight the ongoing devastating wildfires in the Amazon rainforest.

The countries made the 20-million-U.S.-dollar aid offer at the G7 summit hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron in the French seaside resort of Biarritz. Macron proposed that the member countries take part in fighting the fire.

JACUNDA NATIONAL FOREST, Brazil (AP) — Equipped with hoses connected to rubber backpacks, Brazilian firefighters in the Amazon on Monday raced in a truck along dirt roads toward plumes of smoke after a spotter in a military helicopter directed them to a fast-spreading fire.

PORTO VELHO, Brazil (AP) — Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has insulted adversaries and allies, disparaged women, blacks and homosexuals, and even praised his country’s 1964-1985 dictatorship. Yet nothing has rallied more anger at home and criticism from abroad than his response to fires raging in parts of the Amazon region.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Backed by military aircraft, Brazilian troops on Saturday were deploying in the Amazon to fight fires that have swept the region and prompted anti-government protests as well as an international outcry.

President Jair Bolsonaro also tried to temper global concern, saying that previously deforested areas had burned and that intact rainforest was spared. Even so, the fires were likely to be urgently discussed at a summit of the Group of Seven leaders in France this weekend.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug. 23 (Xinhua) -- Thousands of Brazilians marched on Friday evening in several cities in an organized act to defend the Amazon rainforest which has been hit by massive fires recently.

In cities like Rio, Sao Paulo and Brasilia, protesters called for actions to protect the Amazon rainforest from predatory exploration and destruction.

Earlier this week, Sao Paulo witnessed a strange atmospheric phenomenon, as the sky turned dark in the middle of the afternoon, mostly under the impact of the smoke of the forest fires carried by wind currents.

PORT VELHO, Brazil (AP) — Under international pressure to contain fires sweeping parts of Brazil’s Amazon, President Jair Bolsonaro on Friday authorized use of the military to battle the huge blazes while thousands took to the streets to protest his environmental policies.

Brazilian forces will deploy starting Saturday to border areas, indigenous territories and other affected regions in the Amazon to assist in putting out fires for a month, according to a presidential decree authorizing use of the army.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Amid global concern about raging fires in the Amazon, Brazil’s government complained Thursday that it is being targeted in smear campaign by critics who contend President Jair Bolsonaro is not doing enough to curb widespread deforestation.

The threat to what some call “the lungs of the planet” has ignited a bitter dispute about who is to blame during the tenure of a leader who has described Brazil’s rainforest protections as an obstacle to economic development and who traded Twitter jabs on Thursday with France’s president over the fires.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — It happens, on average, more than five times a day in Rio de Janeiro: Police open fire and someone dies.

Brazilian human rights and victims’ groups are raising alarms about the record levels of deaths at police hands in the state of 17.2 million people, with 1,075 slain in the first seven months of the year, according to official figures. And far-right Rio state Gov. Wilson Witzel and President Jair Bolsonaro are pushing to give police a still-freer hand.

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brandishing a fake gun, a man on Tuesday took dozens of hostages on a bus in Brazil and threatened to set the vehicle on fire with gasoline before police shot him dead in a four-hour standoff on Latin America’s longest bridge.

All the hostages were freed unharmed on a 13-kilometer (8-mile) bridge that offers a sweeping view of Rio de Janeiro’s Sugarloaf Mountain and the statue of Christ the Redeemer. The panoramic setting where the man made his move seemed to reflect a bid for maximum publicity in a spot with virtually no chance of escape.

16 August 2019; DW: Brazil's economy minister has said the country could leave the trade bloc if Argentina's opposition wins presidential elections later this year. He also questioned how dependent Brazil's economy was on Argentina.

If Argentina's center-left opposition wins the presidential elections and closes its economy with protectionist policies, Brazil will pull out of Mercosur, Economy Minister Paulo Guedes said on Thursday.