Rio de Janeiro Police Raid Kills 64 in Alemão Favela; UN Condemns Lethality

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – A massive police operation targeting organized crime in Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday resulted in the deaths of at least 64 people, including four Brazilian police officers, security officials confirmed to CNN Brasil. The raid, launched in the sprawling Alemão favela, was hailed by Governor Cláudio Castro as “the biggest operation in the history of Rio de Janeiro.”

The operation, which involved over 2,500 military and civilian police personnel, was aimed at combating the “territorial expansion” of the powerful Comando Vermelho (“Red Command”) criminal group. Authorities reported seizing a “large quantity of drugs” and at least 42 rifles.

The heavy fighting, which comes just a week before Rio hosts the C40 World Mayors Summit climate conference, saw huge columns of black smoke rise from the Alemão favela. Photographs showed the source: barricades of burned cars constructed by criminals.

Rio de Janeiro’s government claimed that during the raid, gang members used drones to attack police officers in the Penha Complex. Governor Castro, reflecting the intensity of the confrontation, labeled the challenge as “narco-terrorism.”

“This is the magnitude of the challenge we face,” Castro wrote on social media. “It is no longer common crime, it is narco-terrorism.”

Comando Vermelho is Brazil’s oldest active criminal organization, involved in drug trafficking and extortion. Police reported arresting at least 81 people during the operation.

The raid has drawn swift international condemnation, renewing concerns over the high lethality of police operations in Brazil’s marginalized communities.

UN Human Rights Office: The UN Human Rights Office posted on X that it was “horrified” by the scale of the violence. “This deadly operation furthers the trend of extreme lethal consequences of police operations in Brazil’s marginalized communities,” the office stated, urging “prompt and effective investigations.”

People react while waiting for news outside a hospital on the day of a police operation against drug trafficking in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on Tuesday.

Legal Precedent: The operation comes despite a 2021 Supreme Court ruling that banned all police raids in similar slums until the end of the COVID pandemic unless circumstances were “absolutely exceptional,” following a raid in the Jacarezinho favela that killed at least 25 people.

The US State Department issued a warning to visitors, advising them to steer clear of northern Rio due to “ongoing fighting between police and criminal factions.” The operation in Alemão, which Governor Castro claimed surpassed the neighborhood’s 2010 security crisis in scale, highlights the endemic gun violence problem: according to the Fogo Cruzado Institute, more than half of all firearms injuries recorded in Rio in September 2025 resulted from police operations.