
Federal government and Rio de Janeiro State authorities agreed last week to create a joint working group to target the cash flow of criminal rings operating in the area, Agencia Brasil reported. The measure was adopted after three people were killed during a gunfight with Rio Police.

Four rivers in Amazonian indigenous territories were found to be at a high risk of mercury contamination, above levels considered safe, Agencia Brasil reported this week citing a study by the NGO WWF-Brazil.

According to a report from Brazil’s Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) released Thursday, unemployment in South America's largest country fell to 6.4 % in the third quarter of 2024 (from July to September), Agencia Brasil reported. These figures are 0.5 percentage points lower than between April and June, when it stood at 6.9%. Compared to July–September 2023, the drop is 1.3 percentage points. In that quarter, the rate was 7.7%.

Venezuela's Bolivarian regime Wednesday summoned its Ambassador in Brasilia to Caracas for consultations in repudiation of statements by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's foreign affairs advisor Celso Amorim, Agencia Brasil reported.

Brazil's Health Minister Nísia Trinidade Tuesday spoke in favor of creating a regional vaccine production coalition to avoid an encore of the setbacks experienced during the Covid-19 pandemic. She made those remarks during a press conference after a G20 Health Ministers' meeting in Rio de Janeiro ahead of next month's Summit, Agencia Brasil reported.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro Monday accused Brazil's Foreign Ministry of being an agent at the service of the United States, which would explain his country not being admitted as an associate member of BRICS, unlike Cuba and Bolivia.

Brazil's government and businessmen gathered last week in São Paulo for the B20 summit, and they concurred on the need to push for world trade reforms ahead of the G20 summit, which will be held in Rio de Janeiro next month.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's candidate Guilherme Boulos failed to win Sunday's runoff to become Mayor of São Paulo, where Ricardo Nunes was reelected in perhaps the most relevant decision of the day, in which allies of former President Jair Bolsonaro prevailed in almost half of the State capitals where a second round was needed. Nunes took over as mayor of the city of São Paulo after the death of Bruno Covas (PSDB), who died of cancer in 2021.

The case of Brazilian poet and composer António Cicero, who died through euthanasia last week in Switzerland, has rekindled the debate in South America's largest country on whether such a practice should be legalized, Agencia Brasil reported Sunday.

A total of 21 supporters of Uruguayan football club Peñarol were arrested this week in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro before a match with Botafogo and charged with racism, damage, and criminal association. “Nobody justifies criminal behavior, but this was a scandal,” said Peñarol's lawyer and former President Jorge Barrera. Brazil's criminal procedural legislation contemplates “these regrettable but foreseeable results,” he added.