The month of June ended with the release of the NGO Article 19 report which states that the world is becoming increasingly authoritarian. The figures are frightening. Only 15 percent of the world population lives in countries considered truly democratic, where the population can receive and share information safely and freely.

The world has regressed back to 1989 levels in terms of democracy, and Brazil is one of the countries where the circulation of information is already considered restricted and democracy is failing.

Eighty percent of the world’s population lives with less freedom of expression than a decade ago. In 2011, Brazil was in the “open” category along with other healthy democracies. In 2016, the country fell to “less restricted.” Now, in 2021, Brazil has been categorized as “restricted.”

Without a doubt, Brazil has become an increasingly less democratic, violent, and dangerous country —for journalists and human rights and environmental activists in particular— but common citizens living in Brazilian favelas as well.

In fact, the month started with the shooting of a four-year-old girl, hit in the head while buying popcorn with her mother in Rio de Janeiro as police officers and militiamen were engaged in a gunfight. This happened a few days after Rio de Janeiro’s second-worst favela massacre in which the police killed 25 people.

Full article at Latino Rebels’ website. Date of publication: 06/07/2022.