May 2, 2000

About 500 landless agricultural workers met with violent repression this morning when trying to enter Curitiba for a daylong march and protest in front of the regional office of INCRA (National Institute for Colonization and Agrarian Reform). About 50 buses carrying the workers were detained at several points near the entrance to the capital of Paraná.

More than a thousand belligerent, heavily armed policemen prevented the landless workers from entering the city in a shocking display of force, attacking them with dogs, tear gas, machine guns and other heavy arms (using rubber and twelve-caliber bullets). The most serious conflict occurred about 5 kilometers from the main entrance to the city on highway BR 277, at about 7:30 am. Landless workers tried to walk on the highway but were prevented by the police, who also threw tear gas bombs into the buses, wounding several workers.

Many of the workers who were subdued and imprisoned by the military police complained that they had been forced to crawl on rocks, their faces against the ground, while they were kicked and clubbed with nightsticks, as the police insulted and swore at them. Even those in police cars were attacked by policemen, identified as soldiers Messias and Alfredo Santos.

At Least 60 Wounded, 30 Held, and Many Missing

Although reports are still preliminary, we have already confirmed more than 60 wounded, many of them seriously, with metal bullets in the abdomen, legs, and arms, and with all degrees of burns resulting from the bombs. Among the seriously wounded is Mr. Antonio Tavares Pereira, who is currently in the surgery room undergoing an operation to remove a bullet from his abdomen. Many of these people were left lying on the ground for more than three hours without medical attention and have now been taken to hospitals in Curitiba and Campo Largo. There are innumerable people disappeared and unaccounted for, since many ran into the woods to escape the violence. Workers from the scene have reported at least 150 wounded, many of whom have returned to the countryside without medical attention.

In addition to the leader of the Landless Workers Movement, Robert Baggio, who was imprisoned early this morning and has already been released, several others workers have been held during the operation. At least 20 people were taken from the scene in military police paddywagons. Nine others are being held at the Campo Largo police station, in the metropolitan area of Curitiba. Several of these workers are wounded, including a seventeen year old pregnant woman. Those imprisoned are being charged with conspiracy and and resisting arrest.

Violence and Unlawfullness

Three workers reported that they encountered another worker's body in the woods, shot in the head, in what appears to be a police assassination. This news has not yet been confirmed, but many of the workers who fled to the woods, now reporting in, have said that a helicopter bombed workers in the woods, and have also spoken of the possibility of casualties.

Dictatorial Regime in Paraná

The Pastoral Land Commission or CPT, and the Landless Workers' Movement, or MST, denounce once again the atrocities of the Lerner government, which has violently repressed any demonstration by workers in Paraná. As if the violent evacuations and arrests carried out in the rural interior of the state of Paraná were not enough, the governor appears to ignore and deny the true meaning of democracy. By prohibiting worker entrance into the city of Curitiba the Lerner government damages the Brazilian constitution and reinforces the climate of dictatorship established in Paraná.

All the while, the large landowners continue to arm themselves and form armed militias with impunity in the rural interior of the state, and have even given statements to the press preaching violence and acknowledging their intention to use force to "assassinate workers if they threaten their property," as reported in the Jornal da Manhã, from Ponta Grossa on the 19th of last April.

We fear that this wave of violence will continue in the interior of the state. We have heard of demonstrations by landless workers in various regions of Paraná and that the military police are mobilizing to repress these actions. Such is the case of Cascavel, in the western region of Paraná, where 700 landless workers are blocking Highway 476, and we have heard reports that the military police are moving toward the area. We will hold Governor Jaime Lerner responsible for any act of violence which occurs in the next hours, for his incapacity to solve these agrarian conflicts in our state.

Pressure the Government of Paraná

We call on all comrades to voice their opposition to the military police action in Paraná, to both the Secretary of Public Safety José Tavares, who commanded this operation (who said he accompanied the entire operation by helicopter!), and to the governor Jaime Lerner, who is ultimately responsible:

Governer Jaime Lerner
011-55-41-254-7345 (fax)
scgg@pr.gov.br

Secretary of Public Safety José Tavares
011-55-41-254-8838 (fax)

Curitiba-Paraná-Brazil, 02 May 2000
Pastoral Land Commission
Landless Workers Movement