This week is about Brazil.
Welcome to the 195 series, where I take you on a mini-tour of every country (and maybe some places that want to be countries). Each week I'll feature a new location. Some you may have heard of, while others may be new to you. The point is to learn and nurture our curiosity about the wider world. Maybe you'll find a new artist or musician you like, too.
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Country Info:
Population: Roughly 214.3 million.
Current government: Brazil is a federal presidential constitutional republic based on representative democracy.
In October last year, left-wing former two-term president Lula da Silva beat the far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, to the relief of many who were sure the Trump-wannabe was going to destroy the Amazon rainforest (According to Scientific American: During Bolsonaro’s tenure, loggers, cattle ranchers, and soy farmers cut down or burned more than two billion trees in the Brazilian Amazon, many of them illegally.)
The Guardian has a profile of Lula, whom they described as "One of Latin America’s most influential and enduring politicians – a silver-tongued statesman Barack Obama once hailed as 'the most popular president on Earth.'"
Lula made his first official visit to indigenous land this week and "expressed support for creating new territories for those communities, but stopped short of announcing any demarcations," according to the Associated Press.
Despite Lula's victory, Brazil remains deeply polarized. According to the organization Freedom House:
Brazil is a democracy that holds competitive elections, and the political arena, though polarized, is characterized by vibrant public debate. However, independent journalists and civil society activists risk harassment and violent attack, political violence is high, and the government has struggled to address crime and disproportionate violence against and economic exclusion of minorities. Corruption is endemic at top levels, and governmental transparency has decreased, contributing to widespread disillusionment among the public. Societal discrimination and violence against LGBT+ people remain serious problems.
Religion: Around 65 percent of the population practices Catholicism, and around 22 percent practices Protestantism. But about 2 percent are practicing Spiritists, following a religion known as Espiritismo or Kardecismo in Portuguese.
A Brown University briefing found:
Spiritism first developed in Brazil during the second half of the nineteenth century as a mediumship religion and scientific discourse identified with the writings of French educator Allan Kardec (born Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail, 1804-1869). Although he defined Spiritism as a philosophy, a religion, and a science, Brazilians tended to grant special importance to healing mediumship since its inception.
Standout artist: Cândido Portinari, 1903-1962. Portinari was one of the country's most celebrated artists, occasionally described as the painter of the people.
Standout film: One of my favorites, City of God, is a 2002 film about two kids growing up in the slums of Rio.
A surprising thing: As early as 2008, Brazil's public health system started providing free sex reassignment surgery to people seeking them.
Story of the week: Brazil’s Rio Grande do Norte state is suffering from serious unrest caused by marauding criminal gangs who have set buses ablaze and carried out gun attacks on buildings in urban areas. The BBC has the story.
What I'm writing:
• I wrote about the Congressional response to Russia's downing of a U.S. drone. Lawmakers are getting serious about pushing the administration to develop a strategy for the Black Sea region.
“With Russia’s reckless behavior resulting in the downing of an American remotely piloted aircraft, we now have unsecured U.S. military hardware within Russia’s reach,” Senator Jeanne Shaheen told me. “The U.S. previously had a presence in the Black Sea that might have allowed us to secure the crash site before the Russians, but now our presence is significantly reduced, and we are forced to defend our allies to assist in recovery efforts.”
This story is unlocked and free to read.
NEW: A look at the Congressional response to Russia's downing of a U.S. drone.
Lawmakers are getting serious about pushing the administration to develop a strategy for the Black Sea region. https://t.co/cg9fg5a0fc— Cristina Maza (@CrisLeeMaza) March 17, 2023
What I'm reading:
• The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin, the New York Times reports.
• Police in Moldova arrested seven people accused of fomenting unrest during pro-Russian anti-government protests, Politico Europe reports. Authorities say they thwarted a Russia-linked plot.
• Russia plans to create “stable pro-Russian groups of influence in the Moldovan political and economic elites,” according to an internal strategy document from Russia’s Presidential Directorate for Cross-Border Cooperation obtained by Yahoo News.
• The Anti-Corruption Foundation, an NGO founded by Alexey Navalny and now run by his allies in exile, published an investigation revealing that some of Russia’s well-known journalists were receiving hefty paychecks from Moscow’s authorities.
• Once the battle for Bakhmut is over, the paramilitary organization Wagner Group will open recruitment centers across Russia and build alliances with regional politicians, the New York Times reports. Analysts say these alliances could serve as a prelude for Wagner’s transformation into a political movement that will aid Russian President Vladimir Putin’s goal of mobilizing Russian society for a long war.
• Read Carol Schaeffer's dispatch from the ballet in Kyiv for the Nation.
• Russia continues to be India’s largest arms supplier, despite its share of Indian defense imports falling from 62 percent to 45 percent between 2017-2022, according to a Stockholm International Peace Research Institute report.
• Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad said he would welcome any Russian proposals to set up new military bases and boost troop numbers in Syria, Reuters reports.
• "Liberal fascism" has become one of the most commonly used terms in the Georgian ruling party's efforts to discredit those who mobilized resistance to their notorious "foreign agents" bill, EurasiaNet reports.
• A group of foreign citizens was arrested on suspicion of spying for Russia, two Polish government officials told the BBC. Six people were detained on suspicion of having installed dozens of secret cameras beside railway junctions and essential transport routes to film the delivery of aid to Ukraine.
• A Polish court convicted a rights activist for supplying a pregnant woman with abortion pills in a landmark trial under the country’s ultra-strict abortion laws, CNN reports.
• A Serbian man whose videos inspired January 6th attackers and who moved to the U.S. soon after the 2020 election continues encouraging political violence on his social media account. The man, Aleksandar Savić, and his wife appear to be proponents of a wide range of anti-communist, far-right, anti-vaccine, and anti-semitic conspiracy theories, the BBC found, something that has sparked concern amongst extremism experts.
• Serbia’s ultra-nationalists are using the Russian war to galvanize their campaign against Kosovo’s independence — and anti-war activists are getting caught in the crossfire, Politico Europe reports.
•The far right in Ireland is rising, EuroNews reports. It is a broad church – encompassing religious fundamentalists, nationalists, and many shades in between – but the movement has recently coalesced around one thing: immigration.
• After weeks of street protests, French President Emmanuel Macron faces a political crisis as opposition groups press for a probable vote of no confidence in his government, Politico Europe reports.
• Meduza's the Beet digs into Central Asia's budding tech scene.
• Brazilian officials are investigating whether former President Jair Bolsonaro broke the law by trying to bring high-value gifts of diamond jewelry into Brazil from Saudi Arabia without declaring them, NPR reports.
• Honduras President Xiomara Castro announced that her government would seek to establish diplomatic relations with China, which would imply severing ties with Taiwan, NPR reports.
• Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s proposed compromises over judicial reform to stave off the risk of “civil war” has been rejected by the government, the New York Times reports.
• A young Saudi trans woman is believed dead after being lured from the U.S. and forced to detransition, VICE reports.
• Anti-government protests broke out in several cities across Iran, spurred by an annual festival – the Chaharshanbe Suri festival – linked to the Persian new year, the Washington Post reports. Unverified videos appear to show protests in Tehran, Rasht, Karaj, Gorgan, Arak, and several cities in the Kurdish region of western Iran.
• North Korea fired an intercontinental ballistic missile just before the leaders of South Korea and Japan were due to meet for landmark talks, the BBC reports.
• At least 22 people, including three monks, were killed at a monastery in Myanmar’s Southern Shan State as local insurgent groups and the military-backed junta accused each other of carrying out a massacre, CNN reports.
• Cambodian artist Sophiline Cheam Shapiro performed a protest dance at the Metropolitan Museum of Art to draw attention to the artwork stolen from Cambodia years ago and remains on display in the Met.
What the State Department says:
You can write to me for any reason at: c.maza@protonmail.com.