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SONIA GALLEGO

ABC News Reporter

Sonia Gallego is an ABC News reporter based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She has covered a number of major international stories, including the Madrid train bombings, the funeral of Pope John Paul II. Over the past year and a half, Gallego has made several trips to Iraq, covering the war as a field producer. She is fluent in Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and French.

View the latest blogs from Sonia Gallego below:

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Brazil's Rainforests: Going Up in Smoke

October 01, 2008 4:16 PM

By SONIA GALLEGO, ABC News

The latest satellite pictures from Brazil’s National Space Research Institute show how deforestation has spiked by over 200 percent in the past year. At various times during the year, statistics have shown that deforestation at first crept up then soared compared to last year.

Much of the blame is being laid at the door of progress. It would be fair to argue that, as environmental issues will always take a back seat compared to agriculture and economic development. Faced with the figures, on Monday, the Brazilian environmental ministry has pointed the finger at the Brazilian government itself as being the worst offender for environmental offenses.  Environmentalists have accused the state Institute for Colonization and Agrarian reform (INCRA) of being one of the worst offenders by illegally giving up rainforest terrain to loggers and creating fake deeds to get around the environmental regulations.

These accusations are hardly surprising.  Corruption is notoriously rife in the Amazonian states where the arm of the law appears to stop short of taking control. Even with this year's highly touted Operation Arc of Fire, an operation spearheaded by the Federal Police and the state environmental agency, IBAMA, to clamp down on illegal logging and deforestation, it's clear to see that this latest attempt to resolve environmental issues has been nothing short of a complete failure.

Other matters, such as a global food crisis and the demand for cheaply produced food are also playing a part. Brazil is commonly known as the feeding bowl of the world.  It is one of the world's leading producers of meat, orange juice, coffee, sugar cane -- which is also used to make the biofuel, ethanol -- and soybeans. As food prices soar around the world and demand continues to grow, especially from rapidly growing economies such as China and India, farmers know where the money is going to be made.

The loggers rule the roost in these parts.  Earlier this year, I paid a visit to the Amazonian state of Para, a place where illegal deforestation is endemic. As with all illegal activities, crime was prevalent and whilst travelling around the woodmills I had to be accompanied by local police officers as the loggers in the area were making threats to anyone sniffing around their territory. Even the IBAMA agents were constantly looking over their shoulders as they tried to carry out their work, accumulating illegally-felled tree trunks and fining the woodmill owners.

The whole area had a depressingly dangerous feel to it, and unsurprisingly whilst driving on a dirt track to another sawmill that was being investigated, we got warned off. A local worker, with a machete around his waist came up to our car, waving his hands and telling us to stop. "Turn around" he said to us.  "They're waiting for you just up that road and they''ve got guns." The IBAMA agent didn't look too happy at the prospect. Not wishing to tempt fate, we turned around and returned back to the main road.

Along the way I asked the driver to stop and let me out at one of the illegally-built charcoal ovens to shoot some pictures. We came across a man who told me that he had been forced into working excruciating hours, filling up the hulking great oven domes with wood to make charcoal, day in day out, and was warned that he would be killed if he tried to escape.

Unscrupulous dealings had pretty much infiltrated the way things worked in this area. The IBAMA agents, in lowered hush-hush tones, would tell me stories of the corruption that they had uncovered, the fake land deeds that they had seen which spurred the illegal deforestation. The mayor of the town that we were in was himself a logger and had absolutely no intention of cutting back on logging activities. The political will to really change and reform this was noticeably absent.

So, the question remains: will the Brazilian government be able to take on this environmental crisis? Not, it appears, without extra help. President Luiz Inacio Lula da SIlva has repeatedly said to the international community that Brazil needs incentives to protect one of the world's most important natural resources. Already it is one of the largest producers of CO2 in the world -- despite having signed the Kyoto treaty, Brazil is the forth largest emitter of carbon dioxide, a result of cutting down the CO2 absorbing trees and then burning them, thus releasing more carbon into the atmosphere. Whilst the current Environment Minister, Carlos Minc, is doing his best to make the Brazilian government accountable for its own environmental crimes, the situation remains still very much as pessimistic as the figures demonstrate.

 

October 1, 2008 in Sonia Gallego | Permalink | User Comments (9) | TrackBack (0)

UN: Rio's Cops No Better Than Criminals

September 16, 2008 3:57 PM

By SONIA GALLEGO, ABC News Digital Reporter, Brazil

It’s a murky deal being a cop in South America’s largest country. High rates of violence and corruption compounded by a thriving drug trafficking industry make for a challenging job.

A United Nations report released this week has concluded that police are largely responsible for a “significant proportion” of 48,000 murders carried out in Brazil.

High crime rates in Brazil are not headline news and indeed are consigned to being a distasteful smudge in Rio’s picture postcard image. This statistic failed to cause a significant outcry amongst the locals who seem to have accepted the high crime and violence as part of a distorted normality, a result of the dysfunctional criminal justice system and people’s disbelief in the law to take on the powerful criminal factions.

But these figures read as a shocking indictment of what lies below the surface of Brazil’s most famous city. According to the UN report, conflicts with police officers killed a record 1,260 civilians in the state of Rio de Janeiro alone. That figure may well be higher as a third of the precincts lacked computers or facilities to report murders.

On average, a police officer will earn $450 per month for shifts that stretch from twelve to twenty-four hours. Security officials have long agreed that this is not a sufficient salary for a job that puts these officers in the direct line of danger. Also it does little to dissuade officers from seeking alternative means to supplement their wages.

The report claims that corruption and infiltration into criminal gangs are not uncommon and the creation of a militia in Rio has worsened the situation. The author of the report, UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Philip Alston himself alleges that "A remarkable number of police lead double lives. While on duty, they fight the drug gangs, but on their days off, they work as foot soldiers of organized crime."

Police officers by day and paid mercenaries by night, they wander around shanty towns asking resident to pay-up for services such as protection, cable TV and minivan bus journeys. Police officers have been ever-mindful that the development of such militas poses a greater threat than the much-maligned drug-trafficking factions, such as the Comando Vermelho (the Red Command).

The report also notes that part of the problem lies in a criminal justice system which is seemingly impotent and rarely achieves convictions even in ordinary murder cases. The UN report states that in Sao Paulo state, only 10% of murder cases are tried in courts and only half of those result in convictions.

The police know full well about the on-going battle to preserve their image in the face of these reports. However, when ABC News contacted the Rio de Janeiro state security department for a response to the matter, the report was rubbished, and I was told that the Secretary of State for Security would not comment on it as the Mr Alston only paid one visit to Rio.

The increased pressure to do something about the drug trafficking factions and high crime rates have pushed police squads to carry out more incursions into shanty towns. This is seen most frequently during the high summer months in Brazil in December, January and February, when more tourists visit the country. This strategy has not yielded much success. As I have found during my own reporting in the region, for every drug trafficker that is killed there are  plenty more foot soldiers to replace him.

It was not all bad news in the report – there was praise for the professionalism of Brazil’s prosecution service. While the organs that hold Brazil’s police to account are said to be impotent, this report could be seen as an important turn to repair and rebuild these broken instruments. It’s a Leviathan task and one that will take many years and much political will but is not without hope.

September 16, 2008 in Sonia Gallego | Permalink | User Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Hizbollah Makes Inroads into South America

September 12, 2008 3:48 PM

By SONIA GALLEGO, ABC News Digital Reporter, Brazil

As the U.S.'s attention has been diverted to the hot spots in Bush’s  "war on  terror," namely Iraq and Afghanistan, their neighbors in South America have been forging other friendships with more distant lands -- in particular with China and Iran.

China has been extremely important in securing agricultural and manufacturing deals with countries such as Brazil and Argentina, but Iran has also been seen as an increasingly important partner to secure relationships with. In the past year, Iran and Venezuela have cozied up to one another, both bound by their mutual loathing of President Bush.

Trade centered on the manufacturing industries has been focal in the Venezuela-Iran get together, but both countries are also seeking to bond beyond trade  -- a prospect that has left observers in Washington -- and Jerusalem -- decidedly nervous.

A recent report in the L.A. Times claimed that the relationship between Iran and Venezuela is also being used opportunistically by organisations such as the Lebanese-based Hizbollah, setting up anti- Western terrorist cells in strategic areas of the continent. Already this year, Iran announced that it was setting up TV stations in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Bolivia, which could potentially be an opportunity for Hizbollah to take their operations further in to South America.

Jewish communities in South America have been vocal about their fears, citing the 1992 Israeli Embassy bomb attack, which was claimed by Islamic Jihad, a group that has ties to Hizbollah. There have long been whispered accusations of gun-running and other shady deals in the tripartite border area between Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay by Middle Eastern organizations with links to terrorism.

Much to the chagrin of the U.S. government, Hizbollah itself is not regarded as a terrorist organisation by many Latin American governments, allowing Hizbollah to engage in more activities in the region.

The deal making between Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Iran, is also a conscious kick in the face to  U.S.  foreign policy. No love is lost between the left-wing governments in many Latin American countries and the  U.S., exemplified by the constant anti- U.S. rhetoric of Venezuelan leader, Hugo Chavez.

Bolivia has also had tempestuous relations with Washington recently. This week, the relationship took a decidedly sour turn when, in an increasing volatile political situation, Bolivia’s President Evo Morales expelled the  U.S. ambassador for allegedly provoking and inciting riots and anti-government protests in the gas-rich region of Santa Cruz, in eastern Bolivia.

Washington responded in kind by ousting Bolivia’s envoy to the U.S. And, not one to be outdone when it comes to the politics of histrionics, Chavez also announced that as a sign of solidarity to his left-wing comrade he too would eject the U.S. ambassador from Venezuelan territory.

Chavez’s rambunctious speech, peppered with expletives last night, was made before a huge crowd of his supporters. He turned the air blue with his theatrical indignation. “Shi**y Yankees!” he cried, “Go to hell a hundred times!,” which got the big-up from his selected audience.

It has all the makings of a Latin American soap opera, were it not for the potentially frightening repercussions.

Venezuela’s oil reserves -- 100 billion barrels of the stuff -- have allowed Chavez to play the Big Man in the name of Latin American interests. But how long can he keep this up for? Food is rationed in Venezuela and the country has become dependent upon food imports from Colombia. His anti-American rhetoric may thunder across the Caribbean, but he is still reliant upon the U.S., which remains an especially important client of the Venezuelan state oil company, PDVSA, supplying it with 1.5 million barrels of oil a day. So much for an anti-Yankee rant.

September 12, 2008 in Sonia Gallego | Permalink | User Comments (44) | TrackBack (0)

Crash Victims' Families Desperate for News of Their Loved Ones

August 21, 2008 2:37 PM

By SONIA GALLEGO, ABC News Madrid

Under a blazing hot sun, the gruesome task of identifying the bodies in  Wednesday’s horrific Spanair crash continued. The work has been painfully slow for the forensic scientists who have so far managed to work out the identities of 70 bodies.

One hundred and fifty-three  people perished in yesterday’s crash -- 22 of those were children. Most of the dead were families who were getting away for a summer vacation in the Canary Islands.

In the IFEMA convention center, located close to Madrid International airport, busloads of relatives made the heartbreaking journey to identify their loved ones.

Although the center was strictly off-limits to the press, one paramedic told us of scenes of utter emotional devastation -- people fainted, broke down in tears and others were filled with anger that such an injustice, or incompetence, was allowed to take place. The family members were brought in, wracked with nervous anticipation only to be led out in the depths of despair.

Today two  more bodies were uncovered at the site of the crash, that of a man and a baby, both so badly burned that they had difficulty in removing them from the plane’s fuselage.

After the heartbreak came the rage. As the relatives of those left behind were left to pick up the pieces, the inevitable why and how began to surface.

To date, there still has been no full explanation for the accident, and an independent commission has been set up to look in to the causes of the crash. U.S. experts from the company that manufactured the MD-82 aircrafts are also being flown in for this investigation.

According to a spokesman for Spanair, it was recognized that the plane had a problem before its fatal takeoff. The pilot, noticing the issue, taxied the plane back to the terminal where technicians took a look at it.

The air intake valve had apparently overheated and so the engineers had switched it off, which, the spokesman said, was "standard procedure." 

The plane then was given the OK to take off after a delay of more than an hour.

Spanair has been battling financial problems for the past year.

Around 1,000 people were to be "made redundant" this week, and 14 planes were to be taken out of commission. It has been reported that the MD-82 in yesterday’s crash was one of the planes that was to be taken out of service after having been in rotation for 15 years.

Other details that have arisen from local press reports (as of yet unconfirmed): The remains of the pilot show that he had broken both his arms, which might have indicated a desperate struggle as he tried to maintain control of the plane when it went out of control during takeoff.

Also the families of the deceased relayed their side of the story in the lead up to the crash.

There were text messages from those onboard complaining of the delay in takeoff. One man on the flight sent a text message to his son saying how he did not feel that he could trust the plane and that he had tried to get off.

He was not allowed to disembark. His remains were later uncovered in the smoky, charred plane.

We spoke to a paramedic, Eva Mitchell, who came from across the country in a taxi to help out, spending hundreds of dollars of her own money to get here.

After working in refugee camps and offering help and support to relatives and firefighters after 9/11, Mitchell has had more than enough experience working  in scenes of destruction. When I asked how she was coping, she replied, “I am used to it, but the burned babies will be in my dreams for a long time.”

August 21, 2008 in Sonia Gallego | Permalink | User Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)