- RIO DE JANEIRO,
Brazil (Reuters) - Two overnight gunfights left 11 people dead in Brazil's
crime-ridden city of Rio de Janeiro as it gears up for its famed Carnival
next month, police said on Thursday.
-
- Six people who police said were drug traffickers died
in what the authorities believed was a showdown between rival drug gangs
in the Tres Pontes slum in the western part of Rio.
-
- Residents of the shantytown told police there were more
dead bodies inside the slum.
-
- In the Mare slum area on the city outskirts, not far
from the Rio International Airport, police shot and killed five people
during the night in a raid that followed an attack on two police patrol
cars on Tuesday.
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- Powerful gangs that deal in drugs and arms control many
of Rio's teeming slums.
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- Last year, a wave of pre-Carnival violence that authorities
said was a retaliation by drug gangs for tough police action against them,
made the federal government dispatch army units to guard the annual festivities
in Rio.
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- Rio's five-day Carnival, which draws hordes of tourists
to the city famous for its beautiful beaches and notorious for one of the
highest violent crime rates in the world, kicks off on Feb. 20. But samba
parade troupes and street processions have already started their loud rehearsals.
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- Two people were also wounded in the latest raid in the
Mare slum area. The number of patrolling police officers has been more
than doubled to 240 in the area, police said.
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