The bodies of at least 40 people have been laid out in a square of a poor neighbourhood of the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro – a day after a massive police raid there.
Police have confirmed that at least 64 people, among them four police officers, were killed in the raid on suspected members of the Red Command criminal gang, but that number could rise as more bodies are discovered.
The raid was the deadliest in the city, where authorities have for decades tried to contain the gangs which control many of its poorer neighbourhoods.
The high number of casualties has been denounced by the United Nation’s Human Rights office, which said it was “horrified” by the police operation.
Police are expected to provide an update later on Wednesday.
Residents described the scenes unfolding on Tuesday in the favelas (poor neighbourhoods) of Alemão and Penha, in the north of Rio, as “war-like”, with shoot-outs between officers and armed men – with buses set on fire to create barricades.
According to the police, gang members also used drones to drop explosives on the officers as they fanned out through the neighbourhoods, which are strongholds of the Red Command.
“This is how the Rio police are treated by criminals: with bombs dropped by drones. This is the scale of the challenge we face. This is not ordinary crime, but narco-terrorism,” the governor of Rio state, Cláudio Castro, said.
Universities and schools cancelled classes and many residents were trapped in their homes as shots rang out outside.
Governor Castro said that the raid had been two months in the planning and was based on a thorough investigation.
Among those arrested is a man accused of being a leading drug dealer for the Red Command.
The governor praised the officers killed on what he called “a historic day” in which they “confronted organised crime”.
Rafael Soares, a Brazilian journalist covering crime in Rio, told BBC News Brasil that the Red Command had been on the offensive in Rio in recent years, reclaiming territory it had lost to its rivals, First Capital Command (PCC).
Soares added that the police operation was part of Governor Castro’s efforts to leave his mark and deal a decisive blow to crime in the city ahead of elections next year.
The police raid also comes just days before the city is due to host the C40 World Mayors Summit – a meeting of nearly 100 mayors from the world’s leading cities – and the Earthshot Prize – the environmental award which will be handed out by Prince William on 5 November.
Huge police raids are not unusual in Rio, but the number of fatalities in Tuesday’s operation is.
According to Soares, police operations in which more than 20 people are killed are “very rare” across Brazil and those that do occur, have mainly happened in Rio.
Rio de Janeiro’s Minister for Public Security, Victor Santos, said that 280,000 people lived in the areas where the raids took place.
Police footage showed heavily-armed officers patrolling the narrow, steep lanes of the densely populated hillside favelas.
“This is a war we are seeing in Rio de Janeiro. Decades of inaction by all the institutions – municipal, state and federal – have allowed crime to expand in our territory,” Santos said.
With additional reporting by BBC News Brazil’s Marina Rossi and Mariana Alvim in São Paulo.