Brazil sees rise in femicides – study

Brazil set a grim record of more than 1,400 femicides last year, a study found Wednesday, as President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva announced a series of measures to fight violence against women.

The total — 1,410 women killed in gender-based violence — represented nearly one victim every six hours, and an increase of five percent from 2021.

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It was the highest figure since femicide records began in 2015, according to news site G1, which compiled the information based on official statistics from each of Brazil’s 27 states.

The increase came even as the total number of homicides fell by one percent, to a total of 40,800 in 2022.

Brazil among the most violent countries

Brazil is among the most violent countries in the world for women, with a murder rate of 3.5 per 100,000 female inhabitants, according to United Nations statistics.

The level of violence against women is “intolerable,” Lula said at a ceremony at the presidential palace to mark International Women’s Day.

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“We are presenting a package of measures to put an end to this barbarity. But we need to go beyond just fighting physical violence,” he said.

The measures include a funding increase for women’s shelters and reviving a support program for victims of domestic violence.

The veteran leftist, who took office in January, accused his predecessor, far-right ex-president Jair Bolsonaro, of “thinly veiled encouragement of violence against women.”

Bolsonaro was regularly accused of sexist attacks, such as his statement in 2014 that a female colleague in Congress was “not worth raping” because she was “too ugly.”

Flanked by his wife, First Lady Rosangela “Janja” da Silva, and Brazil’s first woman president, former leader Dilma Rousseff, Lula said he was also sending a bill to Congress to ensure equal pay for women.