Manchester United’s Antony appears on Brazilian TV to deny assault allegations

  • Footballer denies allegations on Brazil’s SBT network
  • Three women have accused Brazil forward of assaulting them

The Manchester United winger Antony has spoken on Brazilian television denying allegations made against him of violence towards women. The 23-year-old was dropped this week from the Brazil squad after accusations were made of physical aggression on a number of occasions since January towards his former girlfriend Gabriela Cavallin, which are being investigated by police and which he denies.

Since then, the Brazilian newspaper Extra has reported that the influencer and law student Rayssa de Freitas filed a police report in May 2022 against Antony alleging she sustained injuries in an incident involving the player and another woman after a night out in São Paulo. Meanwhile, the banker Ingrid Lana told Brazil’s RecordTV that in an incident at Antony’s home in Manchester in October 2022 he “pushed me against the wall, and I hit my head”.

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Extratropical cyclone kills at least 31 in Brazil and leaves over 1,600 homeless

More than 60 cities battered by storm since Monday night as more heavy rains expected but sparing worst-hit areas

An extratropical cyclone in southern Brazil has caused floods in several cities, killing at least 31 people and leaving more than 1,600 homeless.

More than 60 cities have been battered by the storm since Monday night, and Rio Grande do Sul’s governor, Eduardo Leite, said the death toll was the state’s highest due to a climate event.

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Brazil launches biggest ever operation against illegal cattle farms in Amazon

Taskforce deployed to remove thousands of cows owned by land grabbers from indigenous territory

The Brazilian government has launched its biggest ever operation to remove thousands of cows owned by illegal land grabbers from indigenous territory in the Amazon rainforest.

Three helicopters, a dozen vehicles and a heavily armed corps of police and environment rangers are carrying out the cattle drive, which criminal gangs attempted to block by setting fires on the route, destroying bridges and intimidating drivers.

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Possibility of arrest grows for Bolsonaro over jewellery scandal

Friends and foes of Brazil’s former president believe it is only a matter of time before he is detained

Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, has never shown much sympathy for prisoners.

“Why should we give those dirtbags a good life? … They should just get fucked, full-fucking-stop. That’s what I reckon,” he once ranted.

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Labour’s David Lammy visits Brazil to build ‘climate justice’ partnership

Shadow foreign secretary says Starmer government would work with President Lula on radical climate action

The shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy, has taken his green diplomatic policy for a test spin in Brazil this month in the hope that “climate justice” can serve as an international rallying cry for a future Labour government.

In an interview with the Guardian, Lammy said a Labour victory at the next general election would allow Keir Starmer to build a partnership for radical climate action with Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, before the UN’s Cop30 climate summit in Belém in 2025.

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Brics to more than double with admission of six new countries

Major expansion as economic bloc that includes Russia and China attempts to provide counterweight to the US and western allies

The Brics group of big emerging economies has announced the admission of six new members, in an attempt to reshape the global world order and provide a counterweight to the US and its allies.

From the beginning of next year, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Argentina, the UAE and Ethiopia will join the current five members – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – it was announced at a summit in Johannesburg on Thursday.

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Amazon’s emissions ‘doubled’ under first half of Bolsonaro presidency

New study published in Nature says period was as destructive as record 2016 El Niño drought and heatwave

The first half of Jair Bolsonaro’s presidency was so destructive for the Amazon that it was comparable to the record 2016 El Niño drought and heatwave in terms of carbon emissions, according to scientists.

Annual emissions from the world’s largest rainforest roughly doubled in 2019 and 2020, compared with the 2010 to 2018 average, according to a new study published in Nature, as swaths of forest were deliberately cleared and burned for cattle ranching and farming during the first two years of the far-right leader’s time in office.

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Brics group looks to expand at summit despite divisions among key members

Experts say India concerned about expansion and any overt anti-west turn as leaders fly into South Africa

Leaders from developing countries representing almost half the world’s population including China and Russia are meeting in South Africa for a key summit aimed at reinforcing their alliance as a counterweight to the west.

The Brics grouping summit in Johannesburg is being hosted by the South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, and brings together the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, as well the presidents of China, Xi Jinping, and Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

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Murder of Black community activist, 72, in Brazil prompts calls for action

Maria Bernadete Pacífico, whose son was shot dead in 2017, killed by gunmen at her home in Bahia

Human rights organisations in Brazil are clamouring for justice following the murder of a Black community activist who had been receiving threats.

Maria Bernadete Pacífico, a community and religious leader in the Pitanga dos Palmares quilombo – an Afro-Brazilian settlement of descendants of escaped slaves in the north-east state of Bahia – was killed on Thursday evening.

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Brazil inquiry into alleged Bolsonaro-era pilfering of official gifts widens

Close associates of ex-president – and possibly Bolsonaro himself – have been accused of selling off expensive gifts

“Every Rolex tells a story,” the luxury watchmaker once claimed.

Brazilian police believe that slogan is particularly true when it comes to the diamond-set timepiece at the centre of an investigation into the suspected pilfering of high-priced official gifts by close associates of Jair Bolsonaro – and possibly the former president himself.

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‘The state is murderous’: Brazilians vow justice for 13-year-old boy shot by police

Thiago Menezes Flausino, who dreamed of becoming a footballer, was the ninth child to die in a shooting this year in Rio

Those who knew Thiago Menezes Flausino described him as a boy with dreams. These were brutally shattered by several police bullets this week, when the 13-year-old became one of the latest victims of state violence in a Rio de Janeiro favela.

“He dreamed of becoming a professional footballer. He’d passed tryouts for a bigger team and was going to start playing on the day he was killed,” said his aunt Nataly Bezerra Flausino, standing outside the evangelical church where her nephew’s funeral was being held on Tuesday, mere months after his baptism.

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Thursday briefing: Inside South America’s summit to save the Amazon

In today’s newsletter: After years of rampant exploitation under a far-right government, Brazil has brought together leaders to help secure the future of the world’s biggest rainforest – and create ‘a just ecological transition’

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Good morning. “I think the world needs to see this meeting in Belém as the most important landmark ever … when it comes to discussing the climate question.” For once you can forgive the hyperbole of Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, when he spoke about this week’s Amazon summit.

Leaders from the eight South American countries that share the river basin have been meeting this week in the Brazilian city to discuss an issue that, by any measure, is a global emergency: how to protect the vast rainforest and safeguard its critical role in regulating the planetary climate.

Education | Rising costs and family needs could force one in three students starting university this year to opt to live at home, according to new research. While some of the “Covid generation” of school-leavers said they planned to live at home because their preferred university was nearby, most said they could not afford to live away from home.

Northern Ireland | The UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office has launched an investigation into an unprecedented data breach that disclosed details of more than 10,000 police officers and staff in Northern Ireland. The agency, which regulates data privacy laws, is working with the Police Service of Northern Ireland to establish the level of risk amid warnings that the leak may compel officers to leave the force or move their home address.

Hawaii | Six people were killed after unprecedented wildfires tore through the Hawaiian island of Maui. The fires, fanned by strong winds from Hurricane Dora, destroyed businesses in the historic town of Lahaina, and left at least two dozen people injured.

Ecuador | Ecuadorian presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio was shot dead at a campaign rally on Wednesday. The country’s president, Guillermo Lasso, said he was “outraged and shocked by the assassination” and would convene a meeting of his security cabinet.

Media | Employees at ITV’s This Morning were allegedly subjected to “bullying, discrimination and harassment”, according to staff members who have spoken out after Phillip Schofield’s departure from the programme. Some workers claim they attempted to raise concerns about the programme only to face “further bullying and discrimination” by bosses for speaking out.

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‘Nature needs money’: Lula tells rich countries to pay up and protect world’s rainforests

Brazilian president says developed nations that over centuries have pumped emissions into the atmosphere must ‘pay their bit’

The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has told developed countries to put their money where their mouth is when it comes to protecting the world’s remaining tropical forests, as major rainforest nations demanded hundreds of billions of dollars of climate financing and a greater role in how those resources are spent.

“It’s not Brazil that needs money. It’s not Colombia that needs money. It’s not Venezuela. It’s nature,” Lula told journalists on the second day of a major environmental summit in the Amazon city of Belém.

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Amazon leaders fail to commit to end deforestation by 2030

Eight South American presidents including Brazil’s Lula say rich countries need to pledge more resources to help protect rainforest

Amazon leaders have called on rich countries to help them develop a Marshall-style plan to protect the world’s largest rainforest – but stopped short of committing to zero deforestation across the biome by 2030 amid divisions over oil extraction.

In a joint declaration at the end of a two-day summit in the Brazilian city of Belém on Wednesday, the eight South American countries that are home to the Amazon rainforest said ensuring its survival could not be solely up to them, as resources from the forest were consumed globally.

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Brazilian president Lula pledges ‘new Amazon dream’ at rainforest summit

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva sets out ambitious programme to repair damage done by Bolsonaro and tackle environmental crime

The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has vowed to haul the Amazon out of centuries of violence, economic “plundering” and environmental devastation and into “a new Amazon dream”, at the start of a major regional summit on the world’s largest rainforest.

Addressing South American leaders gathered in the Brazilian city of Belém, Lula offered a bold blueprint for the future of the Amazon, a 6.7m sq km region that is home to nearly 50 million people spread across eight countries and one territory.

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Leaders of Amazon nations gather in Brazil for summit on rainforest’s future

Conclave represents handbrake turn in Brazilian government policy since Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took power

The leaders of Amazon nations including Brazil, Colombia and Peru have gathered in the Brazilian city of Belém for a rare conclave about the future of the world’s largest rainforest amid growing concern over the global climate emergency.

The environmental summit – convened by Brazil’s leftist president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva – represents a handbrake turn in Brazilian government policy after four years of Amazon destruction and international isolation under the country’s previous leader, Jair Bolsonaro.

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‘I shout from the rooftops I exist’: Brazilians identifying as Indigenous up by 90% in 12 years

A growing number of Brazilians are reclaiming their Indigenous identity, after years of fighting for rights

When a census taker came knocking on Vahnessa de Oliveira Ferreira’s door in Rio de Janeiro in 2010 and asked her how she identified racially, she replied “mixed”. Twelve years later, when asked the same question for Brazil’s 2022 census, she had changed her answer to “Indigenous”.

“Indigenous people learned to justify themselves [as mixed-race] because for a long time, being Indigenous was synonymous with being lazy, a good-for-nothing, a savage,” said Ferreira, a tour guide and social educator who now proudly identifies as a trans Indigenous woman.

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‘Winter is disappearing’: South America hit by ‘brutal’ unseasonal heatwave

Buenos Aires records hottest start to August in 117 years, Chile sees highs towards 40C and Bolivia, Paraguay and Brazil also bake

Now should be South America’s bleak midwinter, but several parts of the continent are experiencing an extraordinary unseasonal heatwave that scientists believe offers a disturbing glimpse of a future of extreme weather.

Argentina’s riverside capital, Buenos Aires, this week recorded its hottest 1 August in 117 years.

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Brazil: at least 45 killed in string of police operations in three states

Ten people were killed in Rio favela and 19 people reportedly died in state of Bahia, while death toll rose to 16 in São Paulo region

At least 45 people have been killed in a string of police operations across three Brazilian states, in a particularly bloody week even for Brazil – a country notorious for its police violence.

Ten people were killed during an operation by civil and military police against drug traffickers into the Complexo da Penha favela in Rio de Janeiro on Wednesday morning, with residents saying that heavy gunfire began at 3am.

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Amazon deforestation falls over 60% compared with last July, says Brazilian minister

Marina Silva welcomes progress but says climate crisis means upcoming regional summit needs to produce real action

Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon fell by at least 60% in July compared to the same month last year, the environment minister, Marina Silva, has told the Guardian.

The good news comes ahead of a regional summit that aims to prevent South America’s largest biome from hitting a calamitous tipping point.

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