World News for Students of English

05-06-2019 15:00

In Rio de Janeiro, police killed 558 people between January and April this year – that is 89 more people than in the same period last year. A total of 1,534 people were killed by police in Rio in 2018.

This year’s number is the highest ever. Brazil had programs to reduce the number of police killings, but there was no money for the programs when the country faced an economic and political crisis five years ago. Since then, the number of people killed by police has increased.

The New York Times says that there is more crime because of gangs. In 2018, people elected candidates who want to allow police officers to shoot armed suspects. Rio’s governor said that these kinds of laws can help.

On the other hand, the Human Rights Watch wants to reduce police killings in Rio. It says that police killings are making the fight against crime worse because people are scared of police. Since 2015, 72 police officers were charged with homicide.

Difficult words: elect (vote for/choose), armed suspect (a criminal with a gun), homicide (the killing of one person by another).

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