Around 11 p.m. on Friday (25), a bus running the route from Fortaleza, in Ceará state, to Palmas, in Tocantins, overturned on the BR-122 highway about 15 kilometers from Iraquara, a town in the Chapada Diamantina highlands of inland Bahia. At least seven people died and 13 were injured, according to g1, Globo's news site. The two drivers, employees of the Real Maia bus company, were not hurt. Route and company details were confirmed by TV Bahia, Globo's affiliate in the state.The injured received first aid at the scene and were taken to the Hospital Regional de Seabra, the referral hospital for the region. Military Police and Fire Department crews were called out and were still working at the site on Saturday morning (26).Among the dead is Military Police soldier Luca José Jesus Santana, assigned to the 28th CIPM battalion in Ibotirama. He had been given a lift on the bus and was in uniform at the time of the crash.The Military Police said more victims may be found once the bus is righted, so the death toll could still rise. The cause of the accident has not been determined, and the circumstances remain under investigation.What to knowInjured: being treated at the Hospital Regional de Seabra, the regional referral hospital in the Chapada Diamantina.Rescue: Military Police and Fire Department crews remained at the stretch of the BR-122, about 15 km from Iraquara, on Saturday (26).Toll: the Military Police says more victims may be found after the bus is lifted upright.Investigation: the cause has not been determined.

A passenger booked on a 7:20 p.m. flight from Brasilia to Confins airport, in Belo Horizonte, told TV Globo that boarding had not even started at departure time. On Tuesday evening (22), the boards at Brasilia International Airport Juscelino Kubitschek listed Azul flights as "cancelled". By 8:30 p.m., hundreds of people were queuing at the airline's counters with no word on whether they would fly that night or on another day, according to news site g1.The cause was far from the check-in desk. In a statement released in the early evening, Azul, one of Brazil's largest airlines, said an "instability in the global GPS system" was affecting the operation of its Embraer E2 fleet, built by Embraer, the Brazilian planemaker."As a precaution, the company is adopting operational measures that may result in adjustments to the network and to the schedule of some flights. The company advises customers with impacted flights to check the status of their reservation on official channels before going to the airport."How big the problem isAccording to Folha de S.Paulo, citing the specialized aviation website Aeroin, nearly all of the E195-E2 jets flown by Azul lost GPS signal reception on Tuesday afternoon. At 5:30 p.m., only two were in the air, one bound for Recife and one for Porto Alegre, both having left São Paulo. The other 43 aircraft of the model never took off. At Congonhas airport in São Paulo, the boards showed three cancelled flights by late afternoon, two to Belo Horizonte and one to Curitiba, plus one delay to Rio de Janeiro.The fix is the manufacturer's responsibility. An Embraer communiqué relayed by pilots, which Folha had access to, confirms reports of GPS loss on several E2 aircraft from different operators and says the failure leaves a plane unavailable to fly. Embraer said it is investigating the fault together with Honeywell, the company behind the system, to determine the cause and its extent. Contacted by g1 and Folha, Embraer had not responded by publication time. g1 also asked Inframerica, the company that runs Brasilia's airport, for a tally of affected flights and received no reply.Brazil's other major carriers say they are unaffected. Latam, which has Embraer jets on order, said it recorded no abnormality because those planes only join its fleet in December. Gol said it does not operate the E2 line.What passengers should doBefore heading to the airport, check your reservation status on Azul's official channels, such as its website and app. The recommendation comes from the airline itself.Passengers with affected flights are receiving the assistance set out in Resolution 400 of Anac, the rule of Brazil's civil aviation regulator that defines passenger rights in delays and cancellations.Azul ground staff in Brasilia told one passenger that some flights would be moved to Latam, but that not every destination and passenger could be handled that way.

In many Brazilian towns, the lot under the church on the main square used to belong to city hall. A survey released this weekend measured that practice nationwide: 4,802 municipal rules passed between 1995 and 2025 transfer the ownership or the use of public property to religious institutions. The study comes from the Observatório do Estado Laico (Secular State Observatory, OEL) and was reported on Sunday by Mônica Bergamo's column in the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo, with reporting by Jullia Gouveia.In practice, the transfers show up as laws and decrees that donate plots, lots or buildings to parishes and churches, or grant them the use of such assets. Each one depends on city councils and mayors. The survey catalogued rules from across the country issued over the past 30 years.Why the study calls them unconstitutionalOf the total, 2,162 rules, or 45%, assign the property an exclusively religious use. In the group's assessment, those cases conflict with Brazil's Constitution because they amount to public financing of religious worship. The 1988 charter, in article 19, bars the federal government, the states and the municipalities from establishing religions or churches, subsidizing them or keeping relations of dependence or alliance with them.The OEL is an organization set up to monitor the relationship between government and religion. According to the group, it collects and analyses laws, decrees and other rules at all three levels of Brazil's federation to identify patterns of privilege or unequal treatment between the state and religious groups. Donations of public assets to churches are among the violations it tracks. Researchers linked to the group include lawyer Meliza Franco, who holds a doctorate in state law from the University of São Paulo and serves as executive director, economist Raphael Corbi, a full professor at USP, and federal judge Renato Nigro, an associated researcher.Because each donation requires a municipal rule, the decision to keep the practice or stop it sits with mayors and city council members, while prosecutors and courts can challenge transfers already made. The observatory says it uses the evidence it produces for legal and institutional action, one of its lines of work alongside monitoring and research.What the survey found:4,802 municipal rules across Brazil transfer the ownership or use of public property to religious institutions, from 1995 to 2025.2,162 of them (45%) assign the property an exclusively religious use and were classified as unconstitutional by the OEL.To the observatory, those cases amount to public financing of worship, which the 1988 Constitution forbids.

There is a place in Brazil where the short-term rental business is so settled that Airbnb itself runs a physical support point inside a residential building: the Copan, the concrete giant in downtown São Paulo, as shown in a Folha de S.Paulo photograph from May. In most buildings, though, the relationship is a fight: neighbours complain about strangers in the lift, building managers fine owners, and owners go to court. That whole dispute is now frozen by STJ, Brazil's Superior Court of Justice, which settles conflicting interpretations of federal law nationwide.On Thursday (17), the court and Folha reported that the STJ's Second Section had suspended, across the entire country, individual and class-action lawsuits over whether a residential condominium may block short-term rentals on digital platforms even when the building's convention, its founding rules document, carries no express ban. The court sent the decision to all state courts and federal regional courts, according to the newspaper.What the court will decideThe suspension follows the court's decision to handle the issue under its "repetitive appeals" procedure, a mechanism that produces one binding interpretation for all of Brazil. The designation was approved unanimously on May 26 and registered as Theme 1.443, based on two appeals, 2.272.536, from São Paulo, and 2.272.537, from Santa Catarina, both reported by Justice Raul Araújo. The question is narrow: does a clause stating the building is for residential use only suffice to bar platform rentals, or must the convention spell out an express prohibition?Until the ruling comes, nothing changes on the merits: it neither bans nor authorises short-term rentals, and the frozen cases simply wait. Once issued, the thesis will bind judges and courts nationwide under articles 927 and 1.036 of Brazil's Civil Procedure Code, and should guide thousands of similar cases, writes lawyer Cristiano de Souza Oliveira in the legal news outlet Migalhas. No judgment date has been announced.An earlier ruling hints at the court's direction. On May 7, the same Second Section decided, by majority, in appeal 2.121.055, reported by Justice Nancy Andrighi, that repeated, business-like short-term letting can strip a condominium of its residential character, and that allowing it requires a meeting approved by two thirds of the unit owners, under article 1.351 of the Civil Code. Airbnb's general director for South America, Fiamma Zarife, said in an interview with the newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo, quoted by the portal Direcional Condomínios, that the May decision applied to one case only and did not bind other courts.Congress is working on the same question. Seasonal rentals are regulated by articles 48 to 50 of Brazil's tenancy law of 1991, but no federal law bans them in residential buildings. Bill 2.474/19 proposes banning platform-based seasonal rentals in exclusively residential condominiums unless the convention expressly allows them, and the issue was folded into bill 4/25, the Civil Code reform before the Senate, according to Migalhas. The STJ itself acknowledged, in a 2021 decision quoted by the portal, that "so far there is no legislation dealing with the rental of property located in a condominium building for short periods through apps".What changes nowParties to lawsuits on the issue must wait: cases stay suspended until the ruling on Theme 1.443.The freeze bans nothing and authorises nothing; each building's internal rules remain in force.Building managers can keep notifying units based on the residential-use clause, describing concrete facts such as constant guest turnover, advises condominium lawyer Marcelo Falleiros, of Direcional Condomínios.To allow short-term rentals, the path indicated by the STJ in May is an owners' meeting with a two-thirds vote.

A 12-story building under construction collapsed onto a house early on Saturday (Sept 12) on Rua Tequici, in the Penha district of eastern São Paulo. Six people died, among them a pregnant woman and a child, and a man and a child were pulled from the rubble alive, according to CNN Brasil. Neighbors had reported cracks in nearby houses before the collapse, witnesses told police. Three days later, City Hall suspended 26 projects linked to New Home and Hastiforme, the construction firms behind the building that fell.The suspension was ordered by the CGM, São Paulo's municipal controller, the internal watchdog of City Hall, and covers both active construction sites and permit applications still under review, according to news site G1. The city said the measure aims to "safeguard the public interest" while the causes of the accident and the responsibility of those involved are investigated. Of the 26 projects, 18 are tied to New Home and eight to Hastiforme, and two were filed by both companies. Most sit in the East and South zones of the city.A survey obtained by G1 shows that only five of the 26 projects had an approved building permit, the alvará required in Brazil. The rest were denied, still under review or pending regularization. Even so, there are signs of construction at at least eight addresses, some in advanced stages or even finished. A row of townhouses on Rua Colatina, in Cidade Patriarca, is listed as nearly done without a final permit. A three-story building on Rua Jaborandi, in Penha, appears as concluded with the paperwork still open. And a gated community of "high standard" houses on Avenida Padres Olivetanos, promoted by New Home on social media, had its permit denied even though the city found signs of construction there since June 2023.What changes for residents and buyers26 projects suspended: active work sites and permit applications from the two firms are frozen until further notice.Extra inspections: every active site will be checked by the local subprefectures and the municipal Urbanism and Licensing Department (SMUL); sites that fail structural checks can be shut down.Permits: only five of the 26 projects had approval; the rest were denied, under review or pending regularization.Who answers for the caseThe CGM also removed for 120 days the inspector Viviane Rodrigues de Palma, of the Penha subprefecture, who carried out the 2024 inspection that cleared the work on the doomed building to continue. In testimony to the controller, she said the inspection was done only from outside because she could not get in, and that the site seemed abandoned, G1 reported. The report she signed at the time said otherwise: the work was in its final structural stage and the demolition required by the city had been carried out "in its entirety".The building on Rua Tequici had a record of violations: it was fined (one fine reached R$ 119,000), shut down and targeted by a city lawsuit seeking the demolition of the illegal work, with a court order to stop construction. The permit granted in 2023 authorized a new building, but required the demolition of an old structure of about six floors. The suspicion, under investigation by the CGM and the civil police, is that this condition was never met. The causes of the collapse still await expert reports.On the criminal side, Ronaldo Vivacqua, identified as a hidden partner in New Home, was placed in temporary custody on Sunday (13), and the São Paulo state court (TJ-SP) upheld the arrest on Monday (14). His son Cristiano Vivacqua, the engineer of record for the project, and the company owner Isis Brandão are on the run with arrest warrants; their lawyers said both intend to turn themselves in. In a statement, New Home said it remains at the authorities' disposal and is supporting the families affected by the tragedy.

Passengers who boarded domestic flights in Brazil on Monday stepped onto planes with new rules. If someone turns violent, cabin crew can now hold the person down with physical force. In serious cases, the airline can end the trip early and make the offender disembark before the final destination.The change comes from Resolution 800/2026 of Anac, Brazil's civil aviation regulator, approved in March and in force since Monday, according to the state news agency Agência Brasil and the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo. It applies only to flights within the country. Penalties can reach a 12-month suspension of the right to board.Anac's director-president, Tiago Faierstein, told journalists that the rule responds to increasingly serious episodes on board, such as assaults, attempts to open emergency exits and bomb threats."I like to draw a parallel with femicide: do we need to wait for someone to die before creating a rule? No. If there had been only one case, we would have made the rule anyway. A single case can turn into an air accident."Faierstein made the remarks in an interview to detail the rules, Folha reported.How the penalties workSmoking on board is an example of a serious offense. Sexual harassment and racism are treated as the most serious category. For these cases the base fine is 17,500 reais, an amount that can be adjusted in an administrative process. Proof such as videos or witness accounts is required. Someone who commits the most serious act can also be placed on a "no fly list" that bars the person from buying tickets or boarding domestic flights of any airline for six to 12 months.The penalty is applied by the airline involved in the incident, which must notify the passenger and guarantee the right of defense. Airlines will share the information needed to identify suspended passengers. Crew members, airlines and airport operators can also act on the spot: a warning, calling the police, restraining the passenger or removing the person from the aircraft.What changes for passengersThe rules apply from September 14, 2026, and only to domestic flights in Brazil.Cabin crew may use physical force to contain unruly passengers.In serious or most serious cases, the airline can end the transport contract and the passenger disembarks before the destination.Base fine of 17,500 reais for serious and most serious conduct.The most serious offenses can lead to a flight ban of six to 12 months across all airlines.

Buses on São Paulo's South Side ran packed on Thursday (17), as on any other morning. What was new happened away from the stops: civil police and state prosecutors launched Operation Vectura Corrupta, which investigates the infiltration of the PCC criminal organization (Primeiro Comando da Capital) into the city's bus companies, and one of its targets is Milton Leite, a former president of the São Paulo City Council who built his career in Grajaú, on the city's South Side.The operation serves 16 arrest warrants and 18 search and seizure warrants in seven cities: São Paulo, Santana de Parnaíba, São Bernardo do Campo, Diadema, Santos, Praia Grande and Cubatão. According to Folha de S.Paulo, the warrants were issued by the 8th Criminal Chamber of the state Court of Justice and by the state court that handles organized crime and money laundering cases. The investigation is run by the drug enforcement police station of Mogi das Cruzes, with support from Gaeco, the organized crime task force of the São Paulo state prosecutors' office.For Leite, 70, the court authorized a 30-day temporary arrest. Police did not find him at home; according to GloboNews, based on what officers saw at the property, the Civil Police now considers him a fugitive. In a statement, the former councilman denied it. "I am traveling, I am not a fugitive, and I will turn myself in to the authorities within 24 hours. I will prove my innocence against all the accusations," he said. According to G1, a house employee told officers that he left on Wednesday night (16) for a campaign commitment.Leite left the City Council, São Paulo's municipal legislature, in 2024 after seven terms and four stints as its president. He was the city's second most voted councilman in 2020, with 132,716 votes, and now chairs União Brasil in the capital and the party's statewide federation with the PP, União Progressista. When he announced his retirement from public life, he said he planned to "go fishing, take care of my health, my family and my business".What the investigation saysInvestigators believe the gang directly or indirectly controls part of the companies that put buses on the street every day. Twelve of them are named: Viação Transcap, Alfa Rodobus, Transwolff, A2 Transportes, Imperial Transportes, Move Bus, Pêssego, Allianz, Transunião, Qualibus, Norte Bus and Spencer. In a statement, the prosecutors' office summarized the suspicion:"At least 12 passenger bus companies operating in the city of São Paulo were identified as being directly or indirectly controlled by the PCC, some of which had already been investigated by the São Paulo State Civil Police and the prosecutors' office, including with charges already filed."One of the named companies, Transwolff, had already been targeted by Operation Fim da Linha in 2024, when its then president, Luiz Carlos Efigênio Pacheco, known as Pandora, was arrested on suspicion of ties to the gang. According to G1, the court filing behind the new operation cites statements by military police officers, given in a Military Justice proceeding, that Leite was the de facto owner of Transwolff. GloboNews reporting also found that strategic decisions at companies suspected of PCC links depended on Leite's knowledge or political approval.Also arrested were Levi dos Santos Oliveira, former president of SPTrans, the city agency that runs the bus system, and Danilo Marco Morgado Silva, who ran for mayor of Praia Grande in 2024 and whose current campaign for state deputy had its registration struck down. According to the investigation, Levi held regular meetings with José Daniel Satilite, described as a central figure in the scheme, to discuss the gang's interests in bus companies, and Danilo's 2024 mayoral campaign was allegedly financed by the organization. Vectura Corrupta follows Operation Decúrio of August 2024, which uncovered the PCC's internal communications network, including the Sintonia Restrita and Sintonia dos Gravatas cells, the latter made up of lawyers, and a plan to place organized crime figures in that year's municipal elections. Investigators are also looking into gang financing of campaigns in the current race.What changes, and for whomMilton Leite: target of a 30-day temporary arrest warrant; police consider him a fugitive; he says he is traveling and will turn himself in within 24 hours.Others arrested: former SPTrans president Levi dos Santos Oliveira and former Praia Grande mayoral candidate Danilo Marco Morgado Silva.Where: seven cities, from the capital to the coast (São Paulo, Santana de Parnaíba, São Bernardo do Campo, Diadema, Santos, Praia Grande and Cubatão).Bus companies: 12 firms are named in the investigation; as of publication, no suspension of bus lines had been announced.

Around 2 a.m. on Saturday (12), a loud crash woke Rua Tequici, in the Penha district of eastern São Paulo. A resident, Tiago dos Santos, told news site G1 that he heard a very loud noise and, when he went outside, saw that a building under construction had fallen onto a corner house. The debris reached a nearby square.The collapse killed five people. According to the fire department, cited by the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo, seven people were hit, four of them children, and only two were rescued alive: a 7-year-old child and a man of about 30, according to G1. Two women were pulled from the rubble dead, one of them pregnant. By Saturday morning, 58 firefighters and 21 vehicles were working the scene, joined by state and city civil defense teams. In Brazil, the Civil Defense is the government agency that responds to storms and disasters.The construction site had been embargoed, meaning halted by authorities over irregularities, according to firefighters at the scene who spoke to G1. The cause is still under investigation. The state Civil Defense said the collapse is not directly related to the overnight rain and that, although it was raining at the time, it is too early to say the rain was the only cause. The city's emergency management center, the CGE, is monitoring the site.A night of stormsThe collapse came during a night of heavy rain in the city. The state Civil Defense had issued a severe alert for storms across São Paulo state, forecasting heavy rain, strong gusts and hail. According to CNN Brasil, by Saturday morning there had been 25 storm-related incidents in municipalities statewide, with one person injured, 23 left homeless and 66 displaced; no deaths or missing people have been officially linked to the rain. The strongest gust, 92.6 km/h, was recorded in Piraju; in the capital, the peak was 51.5 km/h.Other collapses were reported overnight in the metropolitan area. In Jabaquara, in the south of the city, a lot with three houses gave way around 4 a.m., according to Folha, and neighboring homes were ordered vacated as a precaution. In Jaraguá, in the north, a garage fell about six meters onto a house and left a car dangling. In Juquitiba, southwest of the city, a landslide hit one room of a house and another home collapsed, injuring a 49-year-old man. In Sapopemba, in the east, a house collapsed and 24 people were displaced, according to Civil Defense.Advice from Civil Defense as the storms continue:Civil Defense sent 15 automatic cellphone alerts, known as Cell Broadcast, overnight to the coast, the Ribeira Valley, Greater São Paulo and other regions; further alerts may follow.During a storm, take shelter and avoid open areas, trees, utility poles and metal structures.Do not cross flooded areas or flowing water, and stay away from roof tiles, signs and other weak structures during high winds.

In Parque Grajaú, on the southern edge of the city of Sao Paulo, Governor Tarcisio de Freitas (Republicanos) stopped during a visit to an Armazém Solidário, a food distribution center, on Wednesday (Sept. 9) to celebrate the state's score in Pisa, the OECD's international exam for 15-year-olds. "We moved up to 2nd place in the country," he said. The state-by-state results, released the day before, put Sao Paulo second among Brazil's 27 states, behind only Parana.The scores combine public and private school students. Sao Paulo scored 434 in reading, 443 in science and 404 in math. The OECD normally ranks countries, but this round it also published results for Brazilian states. If Sao Paulo were a country, according to an analysis by the newspaper Estadao, it would rank above Qatar in reading, below Ukraine in math and level with Chile and Israel in science, within the margin of error.What the numbers showSao Paulo's overall average is 427, against 436 for Parana, which led all three subjects. Santa Catarina is third.Brazil as a whole scored 408 in reading, 377 in math and 409 in science, ranking 52nd, 71st and 67th among about 90 countries and economies, according to O Globo.In reading, its strongest subject, Sao Paulo would place 39th worldwide, near Luxembourg and Slovenia.About 2,000 students in Sao Paulo state took the 2025 exam. Nationwide, 30,140 students from 1,053 schools took part.Tarcisio described the test as internationally recognized and said it measures "logical reasoning, knowledge applied to life situations." State Education Secretary Renato Feder told Estadao he celebrated the results and said the state school curriculum demands content that prepares young people for the future."Sao Paulo had an important improvement in Pisa, in sciences as well as reading, and in math too. We moved up to 2nd place in the country. We will keep working to improve these results more and more, but this really motivated us a lot."A climb that spans administrationsThe rise did not start with the current administration. Sao Paulo ranked 11th among the states in 2006, 7th in 2009 and 2012, 6th in 2015 and now 2nd, a trajectory that crosses governments of different parties. Because Pisa tests 15-year-olds, the students assessed in 2025 started school before Tarcisio took office in January 2023, and the result cannot be credited to the current government alone, as Poder360 noted. The figures land in the middle of an election year: Tarcisio is running for reelection against Fernando Haddad of the Workers' Party, who was Brazil's education minister from 2005 to 2012.The state-level data also expose Brazil's regional gap. Poorer states in the North and Northeast consistently trail those of the South and Southeast, which Ernesto Faria, head of the education research group Iede, said makes the need for greater equity obvious. "It is reasonable to expect a significant association between results and students' socioeconomic level," Gabriel Correa, public policy director at Todos pela Educação, told Estadao. At 15, he added, performance reflects learning opportunities accumulated across a student's whole school life. State rankings carry a larger margin of error, and very close scores are treated as ties.The results arrive in a hard cycle worldwide: the 2025 round of Pisa, which the OECD applies every three years, gathered about 760,000 students from 91 countries and economies and recorded a historic drop in performance. Brazil has improved since 2006 but remains below the OECD average in all three areas. In the country, 72.4% of those tested were in state schools and 84.7% were in the first or second year of high school. Ukraine, the yardstick in math, took part with only 18 of its 27 regions, according to O Globo.

Graves were dug beside the church of São Lourenço, on the island of Fogo, on Sunday as Cape Verde began burying the victims of Saturday night's crash. A bus returning from an outing near the Pico do Fogo volcano left the road, fell down a slope of about 30 meters and killed at least 25 people, most of them children and teenagers. Authorities confirmed the toll in a statement read on the country's public radio on Sunday.The bus was carrying 32 people back to the town of São Filipe. The outing was an annual trip organized privately by the driver himself, who was also killed, shortly before the start of the school year. According to Folha de S.Paulo, Brazil's largest newspaper, education authorities said the trip had not been organized by local schools, although many of the passengers were elementary and high school students.Witnesses told the news agency AFP that one of the bus tires burst shortly before the fall. The vehicle reportedly lost control, left the road and plunged into a ravine about 30 meters deep in a hard-to-reach valley. Other passengers were injured, some of them seriously, said José Canuto, head of the civil defense service of the municipality of São Filipe. There has been no official confirmation of the cause so far.What is known so farAt least 25 dead, most of them children and teenagers, on a bus carrying 32 people.Other passengers were injured, some seriously, according to the São Filipe civil defense service.The first burials took place on Sunday beside the church of São Lourenço, on Fogo island.No official cause has been released; witnesses report a burst tire.Crashes of this magnitude are rare in Cape Verde, a West African archipelago of about 550,000 people in the Atlantic, off the coast of Senegal, where roads are generally in good condition, according to AFP. The excursion was a yearly tradition held shortly before classes resume.

Graves were being dug on Sunday (6) beside the church of São Lourenço, on the island of Fogo. At least 25 people, most of them children and teenagers, died on Saturday night (5), when the bus taking them home from a school outing plunged about 30 meters down a steep slope in Cape Verde. The toll was confirmed in a statement released by the country's public radio.The bus carried 32 people heading back to São Filipe, the island's main town, after a trip near the Pico do Fogo volcano. Witnesses told local media that one of the tires burst, the driver lost control and the bus left the road and fell down a ravine in a hard-to-reach area. Other passengers were injured, some of them seriously.The outing was part of an annual trip held just before the school year starts, as is common in the archipelago. According to Folha de S.Paulo, citing the Reuters and AFP news agencies, the ride was arranged privately by the driver himself, who also died, and not by the local schools. Education authorities said many of the passengers were elementary and high school students.Cape Verde's government is responsible for investigating the causes. President José Maria Pereira Neves called the crash a "great catastrophe" and was expected to visit Fogo on Sunday (6) along with other officials. The circumstances remain under investigation.By the church of São Lourenço, residents and families attended the burials. According to local press, seven bodies had to be buried immediately because of their condition.What is known so far25 deaths confirmed, most of them children and teenagers;32 people were on the bus; there are injured passengers, some seriously;the fall was about 30 meters, after a tire burst, according to witnesses;the outing was annual and was arranged privately by the driver, who died;the local schools did not organize the trip, according to education authorities;the causes remain under investigation by Cape Verdean authorities.Cape Verde is a Portuguese-speaking archipelago of about 550,000 people in the Atlantic, off the coast of Senegal in West Africa. Fogo island is best known for the volcano of the same name, the site of the outing that ended in the crash.

Anyone who spends ten or twelve hours a day behind the wheel of a ride-hail car knows the vehicle is both the tool of the trade and, often, the biggest bill in the household. For those drivers, the road to owning a new car just got longer, in a good way: Brazil's CMN (Conselho Monetário Nacional, the country's top credit policy council, which brings together the Central Bank and the Finance Ministry) decided on Thursday (27) to extend the maximum financing term under Move Brasil, a federal program for ride-hail drivers and taxi drivers, to 84 months, or seven years. The decision was reported by Folha de S.Paulo and also covered by Valor Econômico and Brasil 247. Move Brasil was created in June through a medida provisória, a type of presidential decree, under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Interest rates are set by the CMN itself and sit well below market levels: 12.6% a year for men and 11.5% a year for women, compared with an average of about 28% a year for regular car financing, according to figures monitored by the government. In practice, here is what changes for drivers: Term: up to 84 months (seven years) to pay off the car; Who can apply: taxi drivers and ride-hail drivers with an active registration for at least one year and at least one hundred rides on the platform during that period; Vehicle price cap: R$ 200,000, raised on August 20 (the previous limit was R$ 150,000); Eligible cars: flex-fuel, hybrid or ethanol-hybrid models from automakers enrolled in the Mover industry program. Automakers rush to add models The higher price cap, announced on August 20, came with another change: cars combining electricity with another fuel, such as gasoline or ethanol, now count as hybrids. Since then, according to Folha, automakers have asked the government to include new models under the special conditions. On Wednesday (26), Chinese carmaker BYD said its King, Song Pro, Song Pro Flex and Atto 2 models can now be financed through the program. The brands enrolled in Mover are Volkswagen, Fiat, Renault, GM, Honda, Hyundai, Nissan, Peugeot, Toyota, BMW, BYD and GWM. The driver-focused branch of the program, called Move Aplicativos, was launched in May at an event with Lula at the Casa de Portugal, in São Paulo's Liberdade neighborhood. Decisions on terms and interest rates fall to the CMN. It is the second time in just over a week that the government has loosened Move Brasil conditions, first by raising the vehicle price cap and now by stretching the repayment period.

Passengers who arrived at Santos Dumont airport, in downtown Rio de Janeiro, before dawn on Friday (28) for the day's first departures found cancellations on the boards. The first flight, an Azul service to Campinas, was due to leave at 6:15 a.m., and a Latam flight to Guarulhos was scheduled at the same time. Neither took off: according to Infraero, the state-owned company that runs the airport, 13 morning departures were canceled, most of them bound for Sao Paulo.The cause was an accident the day before. At around 4:10 p.m. on Thursday (27), a small Embraer jet skidded while landing and came to a stop on the grass beside the runway, according to Veja magazine. No one was hurt: only the pilot and one crew member were on board. The airport's emergency plan was activated immediately, and fire crews were sent to the scene.While the runway stayed closed, 15 flights were diverted to Galeao, Rio's international airport, and 71 were canceled across arrivals and departures, Infraero said in a statement. The aircraft was removed only around 11 p.m., when the runway was cleared. Because the planes that were supposed to overnight at the airport could not land on Thursday, there were not enough aircraft for the dawn departures.What changes for travelers on FridaySantos Dumont is operating normally, in visual mode, since Thursday night;13 Friday morning departures were canceled, on Azul, Latam and Gol;The flight network was readjusted and affected passengers were rebooked, some of them through Galeao.Infraero, which operates the terminal, said in a statement that "the flight network was readjusted and passengers were rebooked through Galeao airport". The investigation into what caused the runway excursion is in the hands of Cenipa, the Brazilian Air Force body that investigates aviation accidents, whose technicians went to the airport on Thursday to begin their work.Santos Dumont is Rio's most central airport, sitting on the edge of Guanabara Bay, and handles much of the busy air shuttle to Sao Paulo. Runway problems there tend to hit that route right away, as seen on Friday morning: most of the cancellations were flights to Campinas and Guarulhos.

In Serra da Saudade, a small town in the state of Minas Gerais, everybody knows everybody by name. A 2023 report by Folha de S.Paulo found the town had no gas station and no hotel, and that the local priest knew each churchgoer personally. Under the new estimate released on Friday (28) by IBGE, Brazil's national statistics institute, the town has 857 residents, the smallest population in the country. Some 500 km away, São Paulo sits at the other extreme. The state capital has 11.9 million inhabitants and remains Brazil's most populous city.Overall, Brazil had 214.2 million inhabitants on July 1, 2026, the reference date of the estimates published in the official gazette. Growth was 0.37% compared with 2025, when the country had 213.4 million people. That is slightly slower than the previous year's 0.39%, and IBGE itself projects that the population will grow more and more slowly in the coming decades.The 15 cities with more than 1 million peopleBrazil has 15 municipalities with more than 1 million inhabitants, counting the federal capital Brasília. After São Paulo (11,911,337 residents, according to Estadão), the list continues with Rio de Janeiro (6,731,133), Brasília (3,009,996), Fortaleza (2,582,360) and Salvador (2,559,945). Guarulhos (1,351,284) and Campinas (1,189,761), both in São Paulo state, are the only non-capital cities in the group. Together, the 15 municipalities concentrate about 20% of Brazil's population: 1 in every 5 Brazilians lives in one of them, a share Folha puts at 42.9 million people.Among state capitals, the picture is one of contrasts. Boa Vista (501,000), near the Venezuelan border, grew the most, 3.19% in one year, driven by Venezuelan migration, a trend IBGE had already flagged last year. At the other end, Salvador posted the biggest decline (-0.17%), followed by Natal (-0.13%), Belém (-0.08%) and Belo Horizonte (-0.02%). Palmas (333,200), Vitória (343,900) and Rio Branco (390,100) are the only capitals with fewer than 400,000 residents.By state, São Paulo holds 21.6% of the population (46.1 million), followed by Minas Gerais (21.5 million) and Rio de Janeiro (17.2 million). The Southeast remains the most populous region, with 89 million people (41.6% of the total), while the Center-West is the smallest, with 17.4 million (8.1%), according to Estadão. At the bottom of the table, 2,467 municipalities have fewer than 10,000 inhabitants: they make up 44.3% of Brazil's cities but only 6% of its population. The 54 smallest add up to 78,823 residents, a crowd that would fit entirely inside Rio's Maracanã stadium, as Folha noted.Your city's number is not just trivia. It affects the city hall's budget:The estimates have a reference date of July 1, 2026 and were published in the official gazette on Friday (28).They cover Brazil's 5,571 municipalities, plus Brasília and the archipelago of Fernando de Noronha.The Federal Court of Accounts (TCU) uses the figures to calculate the distribution of the FPM and FPE, the federal transfer funds that finance municipal and state services.IBGE updates the estimates every year, based on the 2022 Census and other sources.IBGE, which is responsible for the calculations, revised Brazil's population projections for 2000 to 2070 in August 2024 and now details the figures by municipality every year. The series shows a country that is still growing, only at an ever slower pace, with the population concentrated in large cities and a few outliers, like Boa Vista, expanding well above the national average.

For anyone who owns a plot in neighborhoods like Vila Mariana, Perdizes or Mooca, what the law allows to be built on that lot sets the value of the property and the fate of entire projects. That is the calculation that the courts have now upended. The Órgão Especial, the top body of the São Paulo State Court of Justice (TJ-SP), ruled on Wednesday (26) that the zoning map from the second stage of the revision of the city's Lei de Zoneamento, the municipal law that defines what can be built on each block, is unconstitutional. The map had been sanctioned in July 2024 by Mayor Ricardo Nunes (MDB). According to g1, the justices found that the changes entered the law without sufficient technical planning and public participation, distorting the original proposal, which was only meant to correct specific errors in the map.In practice, the decision affects at least 15 points across the city whose urban classification was changed through amendments by city councilors in July 2024. They include plots that gained incentives for high-rise construction, areas earmarked for social housing that changed use, and lots reclassified for commercial, mixed and institutional purposes in districts such as Vila Mariana, Perdizes, Santo Amaro, Mooca, Ipiranga, Vila Sônia, Capela do Socorro and Tucuruvi. The full reach is still unknown, because part of the changes went straight onto the zoning map without a detailed description in the law's text.What changes now, and for whomUntil the judgment record is published, expected in the coming weeks: all permits, certificates, approvals and projects filed under the current rules remain valid, a protection known in Brazil as "direito de protocolo" (filing right).After publication: anyone who files a project under the annulled rules takes on the legal risk. The warning came from the head of the Órgão Especial himself, Justice Francisco Loureiro, in the prevailing opinion.If the ruling is upheld after appeals: the July 2024 rules cease to apply and the January 2024 map returns.Even so, nothing changes immediately. A decision by Justice Edson Fachin of the Supreme Federal Court (STF) keeps the effects of the unconstitutionality ruling suspended until the case becomes final, and both the city hall and the city council are studying appeals.Who fixes the lawFixing the problem falls to the mayor and the councilors. On Thursday (27), Nunes downplayed the impact and noted that the court struck down only Article 8, the one that changes the map, not the whole law. He added that if he identifies something "very important for the city" among the annulled points, he will send a new bill to the council to fix them. The city council said it received the decision "with respect", but maintains that both revision laws followed "full compliance with legal norms and the House's internal rules", and that its legal office will assess possible appeals after the judgment record is published.It is worth noting what remains standing: the map sanctioned in January 2024, in the first stage of the revision, was upheld by the same court, which rejected the Public Prosecutor's Office arguments against it. According to a city hall document submitted to the court, that update had already reclassified 3,992 city blocks, about 6% of the total, expanding areas with incentives for vertical development.In the real estate market, the mood is caution. Marcelo Kalil, a lawyer specialized in real estate law, summed up the builders' dilemma to g1:"Once the judgment record is published, a developer who applies for a permit will be betting on the outcome of the case at the Supreme Court. If the STF upholds the unconstitutionality, the construction loses its legal basis."The housing developers' union Secovi-SP and the Brazilian Association of Real Estate Developers (Abrainc) have not yet finished assessing the impacts. In a statement, Abrainc said it awaits the judgment record to evaluate "the measures needed to ensure legal certainty for developments". Urban policy consultant Gabriel Rostey argues that the modulation of effects does not remove the uncertainty, because the market works on long cycles: the price of a plot and the viability of a project depend on its construction potential. Researcher Bianca Tavolari, a law professor at FGV who followed the revision between 2023 and 2024, criticizes the process: she says public hearings were held without residents having access from the start to the map that would actually be voted on, and the final text was presented only hours before the vote. In her assessment, the ruling could set the standard for future urban revisions in the city.

Anyone who walked into the Santos Dumont terminal late this Thursday afternoon (August 27) found departure boards full of red notices and lines at the airline counters. A small Embraer jet skidded off the runway while landing at around 4:10 p.m., and the airport, in downtown Rio de Janeiro, suspended all operations.According to Infraero, the state-owned airport operator, only the pilot and one crew member were on board, and no one was injured. Their identities were not released. The aircraft came to a stop on the grass beside the runway, where it remained into the evening waiting to be removed.The impact on passengers was immediate. By early evening, 15 flights bound for Santos Dumont had been diverted to Galeão International Airport. The cancellation count varies by outlet: Folha de S.Paulo and G1 reported 42 cancelled flights, while Agência Brasil, citing Infraero, put the number at 53. Flights on the Rio-São Paulo air shuttle, the airport's busiest route, were among those affected.It falls to Infraero, which runs Santos Dumont, to clear the plane from the grass and reopen the runway. In a statement, the company said it activated the airport's emergency plan and that the removal will be done with a crane, with support from the fire department."At the moment, airport operations are suspended for the removal of the aircraft, which is on the grass area beside the runway," the Infraero statement said.There is no forecast for when operations will resume. Investigators from Cenipa, Brazil's Center for Investigation and Prevention of Aeronautical Accidents, are already at the airport to determine the cause of the runway excursion.What to do if your flight was affectedUnder resolution 400 of Anac, the civil aviation regulator, airlines owe passengers assistance even when a cancellation is not their fault. According to G1, these rules apply:If a flight is cancelled, the passenger chooses between rebooking, a full refund or alternative transport.After 1 hour of waiting, the airline must provide communication (internet or phone); after 2 hours, food; after 4 hours, accommodation and transport.The airline must update passengers on the estimated departure time every 30 minutes.If the airline fails to comply, passengers can file a complaint on the federal platform Consumidor.gov.br and, for larger losses, turn to the consumer protection agency Procon or the courts.Lawyer Rodrigo Alvim, a specialist in passenger rights, notes that Brazil's Consumer Protection Code also applies: "In the case of a flight cancellation, article 14 of the code establishes that the service provider is liable for the damages it causes the consumer."

Anyone pulling into a neighborhood gas station to fill up a delivery van or freight motorcycle watches every shift in fuel prices. What urban drivers pay at the pump depends heavily on distant maritime choke points like the Strait of Hormuz. With that trade flow in mind, Beijing rejected threats from Washington and warned it will take retaliatory commercial measures if the United States penalizes Chinese oil tankers and refineries that process Iranian crude. According to reports from Correio Braziliense and international news outlets, the Chinese government stated that its trade ties with Tehran are lawful and protected under international law. A spokesperson for China's Ministry of Commerce stated that Beijing will firmly protect the rights and legitimate interests of its companies if the White House imposes financial and operational restrictions on commodity shipments. The dispute escalated after the administration of Donald Trump stepped up pressure against Iranian oil exports, targeting vessels and facilities operating across the Persian Gulf. Washington aims to cut off Iran's oil revenue and has threatened to block foreign firms involved in the trade from accessing the US financial system. China is the primary buyer of Iranian crude, relying on independent refineries and shipping networks to handle the supply. What changes and what is at stake Tension between the world's two largest economies carries direct consequences for global shipping and everyday transport costs: Who is affected: shipping firms, Chinese refiners, and freight operators worldwide. What changes: tankers risk losing maritime insurance, facing port detentions, and encountering commercial blacklists from Washington. Timeline: potential sanctions and retaliatory measures depend on executive enforcement orders rolled out by the US government. Consumer impact: supply disruptions push international crude benchmarks higher, raising diesel and gasoline prices at local pumps. China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs named the United States as responsible for creating friction across global supply chains. Beijing declared that unilateral sanctions outside the United Nations framework disrupt regular commerce. In response, US officials maintain that they will enforce national security measures to cut off funding to Tehran.

Drivers traveling daily between Campinas and Ribeirão Preto in upstate São Paulo know well the bottlenecks of single-lane stretches and delays at toll plazas during peak hours. That routine is set to change as the state government transfers highway management to private operators. The Rota Mogiana consortium, formed by engineering firms Azevedo & Travassos and Quimassa Infraestrutura, signed on Wednesday (26) a highway concession contract with the government of São Paulo. The agreement forecasts R$ 9.4 billion (around $1.7 billion) in investments over 30 years across 520 kilometers of roads extending toward the Minas Gerais border, according to Folha de S.Paulo. The project spans 22 municipalities and will directly affect daily travel for an estimated 2.3 million residents. Planned improvements include road widening, safety upgrades, and the rollout of automatic free-flow toll gantries that charge drivers electronically without requiring stops at physical toll booths. Key details of the project Coverage: 520 kilometers linking Campinas, Ribeirão Preto, and municipalities near Minas Gerais. Contract terms: 30-year concession with R$ 9.4 billion earmarked for infrastructure works. Tolls: transition to automatic electronic toll gantries along the corridor. Beneficiaries: 2.3 million residents across 22 cities in São Paulo state. State officials and consortium leaders say the long-term upgrades aim to relieve congestion on busy freight corridors, support regional agricultural transport, and lower crash rates on heavily traveled routes.

On the streets of Bixiga, anyone walking past the site where the Vai-Vai samba school once stood now finds silent bulldozers and only a few workers on patrol. Instead of heavy machinery and dust, the construction site in central São Paulo looks more like a quiet storage yard for steel and building materials.The pause comes down to history beneath the pavement. Excavation work on the future 14 Bis-Saracura station on Line 6-Orange of the São Paulo Metro has been suspended indefinitely. The shutdown followed the discovery of new archaeological remains tied to religious practices of African heritage and the historic Quilombo Saracura, an urban settlement formed by formerly enslaved people, according to Folha de S.Paulo.Artifacts found two meters deepSpecialists from archaeological consultancy A Lasca, hired to oversee the site, uncovered the artifacts 2.2 meters below ground. Inside a buried room, the team found small mounds of indigo powder, tied bundles of twigs, and other ritual items commonly used in Afro-Brazilian religious traditions.What commuters and residents need to know:Work suspended: All digging and heavy construction across the 14 Bis-Saracura site are completely paused.Timeline: There is no official date for work to restart at this specific location.Line 6 progress: While other parts of Line 6-Orange have started partial operations, the Bixiga station remains on hold.Waiting for heritage authoritiesConcessionaire Linha Uni, led by Spanish infrastructure firm Acciona, is responsible for building and operating the line. The consortium confirmed the full stoppage and stated that it is waiting for guidelines from Iphan, Brazil's national historical and artistic heritage institute, to determine how to protect the artifacts before rescheduling construction work. Iphan received the technical archaeological report in late July and is reviewing conservation requirements.

In the waiting rooms of neighbourhood clinics across São Paulo and the ABC industrial belt, families are once again pulling yellow vaccination cards from their bags. The state of São Paulo has confirmed 26 cases of measles so far in 2026, according to figures released by the State Health Secretariat. The jump has put local clinics on alert, especially after the state registered just two cases in all of 2025.Most of the infections are concentrated in the metropolitan area: 23 in the capital city, two in São Bernardo do Campo, and one in Guarulhos. Health authorities report that two cases were imported from outside the region, while the remaining 24 stem from secondary transmissions linked to those travelers. The most recent cases in the city of São Paulo involve two infants under one year of age and a woman in her 30s, none of whom had been vaccinated. Overall, 19 of the 26 patients were either unvaccinated or missing doses.The virus spreads easily through the air, particularly on crowded buses, commuter trains, and indoor spaces where vaccination rates have dipped. State data shows vaccination coverage in São Paulo at 89.35% for the first dose and 74.64% for the second dose, both well short of the official 95% target needed to prevent community outbreaks.Vaccination drive detailsTo curb the spread, state and federal health authorities have mounted targeted campaigns across municipal health posts (known locally as UBS):Target audience: Anyone aged 6 months to 59 years living in or traveling through the affected cities.Locations: Public health clinics in São Paulo, São Bernardo do Campo, and Guarulhos.Deadline: The special immunization drive runs through September 1, alongside the National Multivaccination Campaign.Measles symptoms typically appear between 7 and 14 days after exposure and include high fever, cough, runny nose, red eyes, and a spreading skin rash. Health officials advise anyone with symptoms to wear a mask, avoid crowded public transit, and head directly to a local health clinic for evaluation.

In an American Midwest grocery store, a pound of ground beef now costs 79% more than it did in early 2019, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That squeeze on household budgets, more than any abstract free trade debate, is what pushed President Donald Trump to promise on Wednesday that he will review the rules governing beef processing in the country, even as he keeps a separate pledge to temporarily lower tariffs on imported beef.Trump made the comment on host Glenn Beck's radio program, after Beck suggested that cutting red tape at the Department of Agriculture would let smaller ranchers slaughter their own cattle instead of relying on large processors. 'That could be a great thing for the ranchers,' Trump replied, then sharpened his tone: 'I've only heard bad things about it, it's four companies, and it's a monopoly.'The four companies Trump referred to control roughly 85% of all beef processing in the United States: Cargill, Tyson Foods, JBS USA and National Beef Packing Co. Two of them, JBS USA and National Beef, are owned by Brazilian companies JBS and MBRF. Last year, the U.S. Department of Justice was already investigating whether these processors were artificially inflating prices paid by consumers.What changes, for whomThe deregulation talk adds to a measure Trump had already announced the previous week: a temporary tariff cut meant to rein in beef prices, which are at record highs in American supermarkets.For 90 days, the United States will allow imports of up to 300,000 tons of beef destined for ground beef production without tariffs beyond the quotaTrump expects that volume to reach consumers at a price 25% lower than what is currently charged in the American marketThe measure aims to ease the market while the U.S. cattle herd, which has shrunk in recent years, rebuildsAmerican producers themselves, however, pushed back. The American Farm Bureau Federation, the sector's main lobbying group, formally asked Trump to reverse course. In a letter sent Tuesday, the group's president, Zippy Duvall, said the measure 'will hurt... United States ranchers, who work tirelessly to produce food for American families.' Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters at the White House on Tuesday that she did not even know which countries were included in Trump's tariff reduction announcement.The episode exposes a tension inside Trump's own political base: ranchers who want higher tariffs to protect domestic cattle prices on one side, consumers squeezed by rising grocery bills on the other, and a president trying to balance both without a clear answer on which countries will benefit from the import quota, a question with direct implications for Brazilian meatpackers JBS and MBRF, which supply much of the U.S. market through their American subsidiaries.

A school bus carrying ten children, a monitor and the driver fell off a ravine on a rural road in Rio do Oeste, in the Itajaí Valley region of Santa Catarina state in southern Brazil, on the afternoon of Tuesday, August 25, according to newspaper Folha de S.Paulo. The vehicle, part of the municipal school transport fleet, plunged about ten meters after leaving the road.Two children were injured and taken to a hospital in the city for medical evaluation. According to the report, they were conscious and talking when they received care. As of the report's publication, there was no update on the health condition of the two injured children.According to the Rio do Oeste city government, fire department and Samu (the mobile emergency medical service) teams responded to everyone involved at the accident scene. All ten children underwent medical evaluation on site, and eight of them were sent home accompanied by parents or other relatives.In a statement, the city government said it is monitoring the situation and providing support to the families of the children involved as well as to education staff in the municipality. Authorities are still investigating the causes of the accident, including what led the bus to leave the road before falling into the ravine.This report is based on information from Folha de S.Paulo, drawing on a statement from the Rio do Oeste city government. Further details on the injured children's condition and the cause of the crash are expected as the investigation continues. In Brazil, municipal governments are responsible for running school bus services in rural areas, often over unpaved roads like the one where this accident occurred.

A collision between a tour bus and a truck left two people dead and at least 26 injured in the early hours of Monday (24) on the BR-040 federal highway, in Capim Branco, in the metropolitan region of Belo Horizonte, in southeastern Brazil. According to G1, the crash was recorded at around 4:50 a.m. near kilometer 491 of the highway, which was fully closed to traffic during the morning.According to initial information from the Fire Department, the truck, which was traveling toward Brasilia, crossed into the opposite lane and hit the bus. Both vehicles caught fire on impact and were destroyed, and the flames also reached vegetation on the roadside. Videos circulating on social media show the vehicles ablaze and, later, their burned-out shells. According to CNN Brasil, the bus overturned and blocked both lanes of the highway.The bus, operated by Viação Pássaro Verde, had left Minas Novas, in the Jequitinhonha Valley region of Minas Gerais state, at 8:30 p.m. on Sunday (23), bound for the state capital, Belo Horizonte. There were 27 passengers on board, in addition to the driver.Victims and injuredThe fatalities are a man who was in the truck and a female passenger on the bus. Their names and ages were not released. In total, 25 injured people were taken to the Sete Lagoas Municipal Hospital, and one person was treated at an urgent care unit (UPA) in the city, G1 reported. Three patients were in serious condition: a 32-year-old woman, a ten-month-old baby and a man who was carrying no identification. By early Monday afternoon, 14 of the injured had been discharged. Initial reports from CNN Brasil had put the number of injured at 23, a figure revised upward to at least 26 during the morning.Traffic on the BR-040 was released at around 11:30 a.m. Teams from Samu, Brazil's emergency medical service, and an ambulance from Via Cristais, the concessionaire that manages the stretch, took part in the rescue, and the Federal Highway Police were at the scene to register the occurrence.In a statement, Viação Pássaro Verde said it is following "the investigation of the facts with the responsible authorities" and is "providing all necessary support to the victims and their families". The cause of the crash will be investigated.

The Rio de Janeiro Military Police launched an operation on Monday morning (24) in the communities of Parada de Lucas and Vigário Geral, in the city's North Zone, to fight the religious intolerance imposed by drug traffickers in the area known as the Israel Complex, a cluster of favelas named after the Israeli symbols adopted by the local faction. In response, criminals set trucks on fire and blocked the Avenida Brasil, one of the city's main expressways. According to O Globo, four trucks were burned.According to G1, the criminals drove the trucks across the expressway's lanes near Acari and set them on fire to block traffic. Teams from the expressway patrol battalion (BPVE), the tactical motorcycle battalion (BTM) and the crowd control unit (Recom) were sent to the stretch. R7 reported that the Avenida Brasil and the Linha Vermelha expressway were closed as a precaution, a step the police said follows the protocol for operations in communities near major roadways to protect drivers.Second phase of the offensiveMonday's action is the second phase of an operation that began after police stabilized the Cidade Alta community and neighboring areas, according to the force. More than 200 officers were mobilized, with teams from the Bope special operations battalion, the K-9 and Shock battalions and the helicopter unit, plus five armored vehicles, drones and aircraft, R7 detailed. R7 and Folha de S.Paulo reported intense gunfire and burning barricades at the entrances to the communities.Besides containing a territorial dispute between gangs and fighting vehicle and cargo theft, the operation targets what police describe as persecution and religious intolerance against minorities, including followers of Afro-Brazilian religions and other Christian groups. The faction that controls the area has adopted Israeli symbols as a religious reference. According to O Globo, one of the men arrested on Monday wore a bulletproof vest bearing the Israeli flag under the words "Bonde dos Taca Bala", with no institutional link to the State of Israel.In Parada de Lucas and Vigário Geral, four men were arrested and police seized two rifles, two grenades, a radio transmitter, a vest and drugs, according to G1. In the day's tally, which included actions in the Chapadão complex, the Vargens area and Gardênia Azul, police reported nine suspects arrested and seven rifles seized. According to R7, the offensive is part of the force's strategy to restore policing capacity in the region and improve safety for residents.