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The Jewish Federation of Sao Paulo reported cases of anti-Semitic graffiti, harassment, vandalism, and threats via telephone and e-mail. Police and Jewish Federation of Sao Paulo representatives stated that anti-Semitic Web sites and blogs grew rapidly during the year. Occasional anti-Semitic graffiti and anti-Semitic epithets directed at Orthodox Jews were also visible in some of Sao Paulo's traditional Jewish neighborhoods. At year's end the 2nd Court of Justice of Porto Alegre continued to take testimony but had not set a trial date in the case of 14 persons charged with attempted murder, gang formation, and racism for attacking three Jewish students in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul.
For a more detailed discussion, see the International Religious Freedom Report. The constitution provides for freedom of movement within the country, foreign travel, emigration, and repatriation, and the government generally respected these rights in practice, although there were restrictions on entry into protected indigenous areas. The law provides for the granting of asylum or refugee status in accordance with the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its protocol, and the government has established a system for providing protection to refugees.
In practice the government provided protection against the expulsion or return of refugees to countries where their lives or freedom would be threatened.
The government provided temporary protection to individuals who may not qualify as refugees under the convention and the protocol. According to the National Committee for Refugees, at the end of the year there were 3, recognized refugees in the country. During the year authorities granted refugee status to individuals. Those who maintain their status, which is reviewed every two years, may receive identity and travel documents and work and study in the country. From to , 4, persons sought asylum, according to news reports.
There were, in addition to officially recognized refugees, approximately 17, de facto Colombian refugees in the country's Amazon region, according to the World Refugee Survey. Many asylum seekers did not have government support because of the poor infrastructure in the region.
Relations with local communities were increasingly difficult because of pressures on the educational and health systems. The law provides citizens with the right to change their government peacefully, and citizens exercised this right in practice through periodic, free, and fair elections held on the basis of universal suffrage. Military conscripts may not vote. In the national election generally considered free and fair, Workers' Party candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva won a second four-year term as president.
Militias were suspected of intimidating residents of Rio de Janeiro's favelas to vote for particular candidates in October municipal elections. The defense minister deployed army troops to 24 communities, identified by the Regional Electoral Court as at-risk for voter intimidation by militias and other criminal organizations, to supplement local security forces in protecting the election process.
In the event no major incidents of voter intimidation were reported. Women have full political rights. The law requires that 30 percent of candidates in each political party must be registered by women. There were 10 women in the member Senate and 45 women in the member Chamber of Deputies. Women occupied There were three self-identified Afro-Brazilians in the cabinet and one on the Federal Supreme Court. The law provides criminal penalties for official corruption; however, the government did not implement the law effectively, and officials frequently engaged in corrupt practices with impunity.
The World Bank's worldwide governance indicators reflected that corruption was a serious problem. In June Federal Police uncovered an alleged scheme involving fraudulent public works contracts valued at an estimated l. Police operation "Joao de Barro" claimed that four members of the Chamber of Deputies conspired to defraud the government through contracts for projects in cities.
Despite the allegations the government authorized some of the investigated contracts to be paid in August, under the scrutiny of the Comptroller General's Office; the Federal Police head in Minas Gerais State announced the investigations were concluded; and by year's end no formal charges had been laid.
On July 8, Federal Police broke up an alleged financial crimes scheme, in operation since , that included money laundering, tax evasion, conspiracy, and other crimes involving public funds. At year's end the investigation was ongoing; several senior officials were suspected of involvement, but none had been charged.
On December 2, in a related case, a federal judge sentenced the Opportunity Bank owner to 10 years in prison for corruption.
On September 16, Federal Police temporarily detained Romero Menezes, the executive director of the Federal Police and its second-ranking official, under suspicion of leaking information to his brother about an investigation into a fraud scheme involving a railroad concession in Amapa. Authorities placed Menezes on administrative leave, and the Federal Police head replaced the officers in charge of the investigation, which was continuing at year's end.
On May 13, following Federal Police accusations in of conspiracy to defraud the government through overpriced public works contracts, the Public Ministry formally charged 61 persons, including a former minister of mines and energy, two state governors, and two former state governors. Although in the Supreme Court ruled that prosecution should proceed, during the year there were no significant developments in the cases pending against 40 persons accused of illegal payments to legislators in exchange for support of government legislation.
Public officials were subject to financial disclosure laws. The agencies identified campaign financing and public spending as sources of financial corruption; however, they had limited powers to function effectively. The law provides for public access to unclassified government information upon application to the Commission for Public Ethics; however, the bureaucratic process often slowed release of such information.
A number of domestic and international human rights groups generally operated without government restriction, investigating and publishing their findings on human rights cases. Federal officials often were cooperative and responsive to their views. Although federal and state officials in many cases sought the aid and cooperation of domestic and international NGOs in addressing human rights problems, human rights monitors occasionally were threatened and harassed for their efforts to identify and take action against human rights abusers, particularly by members of the state police.
While most states had police ombudsmen, some NGOs and human rights observers questioned their independence and effectiveness. The ombudsmen's accomplishments varied considerably, depending on such factors as funding and outside political pressure. The Chamber of Deputies and the Senate each have human rights commissions that operated without interference and participated in several activities nationwide in coordination with domestic and international human rights organizations.
Although the law prohibits and penalizes discrimination on the basis of race, gender, disability, or social status, discrimination against women, Afro-Brazilians, homosexuals, and indigenous persons continued. Rape, including spousal rape, is a crime punishable by eight to 10 years' imprisonment; however, men who killed, sexually assaulted, or committed other crimes against women were unlikely to be brought to trial.
The federal government continued to operate a toll-free hour hot line nationwide. It received , calls during the year, a 32 percent increase compared with , including reports of 13, cases of physical violence, an additional 6, cases of threats of violence, rapes, and attempted killings. According to data from January to June, approximately 60 percent of the callers reported being beaten daily and 18 percent, weekly; 64 percent of the callers reported being beaten by domestic partners, who in the majority of cases were under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
From January to September, the Sao Paulo State Secretariat for Public Safety registered 2, rape cases, compared with 4, during the same period in There was no information available on the numbers of prosecutions or convictions for rape. Domestic violence remained both widespread and underreported. During the year there were 24, cases of domestic violence registered nationwide, compared with 20, cases in For such cases the law increases the penalty from one to three years in prison and creates special courts.
The federal government stimulated the creation of these courts and promoted capacity-building courses for judges. There were at the end of the year a total of 61 such courts established, along with 15 public defender positions to provide free legal assistance to domestic violence victims. At least 17 of the 26 states plus the Federal District had such courts. There was no information available on the numbers of prosecutions or convictions for domestic violence.
Each state secretariat for public security operated "delegacias da mulher" DEAMs , police stations dedicated exclusively to addressing crimes against women, for a total of countrywide.
The quality of services varied widely, and availability was particularly limited in isolated areas. For example, the North and Northeast regions, which contained approximately 35 percent of the country's population, possessed only 24 percent of the country's DEAMs. The stations provided psychological counseling, temporary shelter, and hospital treatment for victims of domestic violence and rape including treatment for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases as well as criminal prosecution assistance by investigating and forwarding evidence to courts.
There were also reference centers and 66 women's shelters. In Rio de Janeiro, the city's Rio Women Program provided assistance to female victims of domestic violence who received death threats. When necessary, victims were sent to specific shelters, which also provided psychological and legal aid. In addition to the Women Program, victims of domestic violence could obtain assistance at the Center for Women's Support, an initiative of the Rio de Janeiro state government that offered a complaint hot line, shelters, and psychological and legal aid.
The law requires health facilities to contact the police regarding cases in which a woman was harmed physically, sexually, or psychologically in order to collect evidence and statements should the victim decide to prosecute. Prostitution is legal, but exploiting it through associated activities, such as operating a brothel, is illegal. While no specific laws address sex tourism, it is punishable under other criminal offenses, and there was a government-released "code of conduct to combat sex tourism and sexual exploitation" and government-conducted campaigns in the most affected areas.
The Federal District and the states of Pernambuco, Espirito Santo, Amazonas, and Parana enacted laws requiring certain businesses to display signs listing the penalties for having sexual intercourse with a minor. Rio de Janeiro and Bahia states had similar legislation. Women's groups reported that prostitutes encountered discrimination when seeking free medical care. Trafficking of women for the purpose of prostitution was a serious problem. Sexual harassment is a criminal offense, punishable by up to two years in prison.
The law encompasses sexual advances in the workplace or in educational institutions and between service providers or clients. In the workplace it applies only in hierarchical situations, where the harasser is of higher rank or position than the victim. Although the law was enforced, accusations were rare, and the extent of the problem was not documented. Women have the same legal rights as men. A cabinet-level office, the Secretariat for Women's Policy, oversees a special entity charged with ensuring the legal rights of women.
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Although the law prohibits discrimination based on gender in employment and wages, there were significant wage disparities between men and women. The law provides days of paid maternity leave to women and seven days of paternity leave to men. The law also prohibits employers from requiring applicants or employees to take pregnancy tests or present sterilization certificates, but some employers sought sterilization certificates from female job applicants or tried to avoid hiring women of childbearing age. Violations of the law are punishable by jail terms of up to two years for employers, while the company may be fined 10 times the salary of its highest-paid employee.
The government continued its commitment to children's rights and welfare, but millions of children suffered from the poverty afflicting their families, worked to survive, and failed to get an education. There were wide discrepancies between the more affluent states of the south and southeast and the poorer states of the north and northeast regions of the country, with the states of Bahia, Ceara, Maranhao, and Sergipe each registering fewer than 80 percent of births and the states of Alagoas, Piaui, Amapa, and Roraima, fewer than 70 percent.
While the law prohibits subjecting any child or adolescent to any negligence or abuse, such abuse was a major problem. According to SEDH the increase does not necessarily represent an increase in cases of abuse, but rather an increase in denunciations to the hot line as public campaigns raise awareness. Physical and psychological aggression was a major problem, with more than 10, complaints or approximately one third of the total recorded by the national hot line, a decrease compared to the more than 19, complaints in in this category.
Allegations of abuse of minors and prosecution of crimes against children were not pursued adequately or aggressively. Child prostitution was a problem, with extreme poverty the primary contributor. The largest percentage of these cases occurred in the Northeast, but all areas of the country had reported incidents. In the Amazon, region sexual exploitation of children took place in brothels that catered to mining settlements. In large urban centers, girls who left home to escape abuse or sexual exploitation often prostituted themselves on the streets to survive.
In the cities along the northeast coast, sexual tourism exploiting children was prevalent and involved networks of travel agents, hotel workers, taxi drivers, and others who actively recruited children and also trafficked them outside the country. Child prostitution also developed in the areas served by the country's navigable rivers, particularly in ports and at international borders. The Federal Police estimated that upward of , children were involved in prostitution.
The national hot line reported that there were 10, cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents during the year. The University of Brasilia study found that of the 1, tourist destinations frequented by citizens had an active sexual commercial market for children and adolescents. Trafficking in children for the purpose of prostitution was a serious problem.