To mention one example: a few months ago, before his detention as part of Satiagraha operation, the most visible face of the group Opportunity had placed stocks in (Italian corporation) Telecom and Telemar, for nearly a billion dollars.

Last Saturday, nine activists from the Rural Landless Peasant Movement of Brazil (MST) were injured in a demonstration outside an estate owned by Dantas in Espiritu Santo, Para state.

Also in Espirito Santo, a massacre took place in 1996, where 19 landless peasants were killed. Every year there are mobilizations in their honor on April 17th, the International Day of Peasant Struggle.

The MST in Para was taking part in one of the many demonstrations to mark this tragic day. When they were coming back to their camp, they were intercepted by gunmen who work in Dantas plot of land.

Nine activists were injured (one of them is seriously injured) and other three were taken hostage for hours as a result of the ambush. As a result of the incidents, the local media published information that was later denied by the MST on their website.

There, they clarify that there was no intention of occupying Santa Barbara estate and that no journalists were taken hostage by MST, as some national networks had reported.

“The MST workers were unarmed and they were barely carrying work tools and flags of the movement”, they say in a press release.

While some media corporations try to cause confusion around the struggle for land in Brazil, the latest data is clear about who are the victims and who are the victimizers.

According to a report published a few days ago by the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT), in the thirteen years that followed the El Dorado dos Carajás massacre, 227 landless peasants have been murdered over conflicts in the rural area.