The activist of the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT), an organization of the Catholic Church, José Amaro Lopes de Sousa, was arrested by the Civil Police in Anapu, southwest of Pará, on the morning of March 27.
He is being investigated by the Anapu Civil Police for alleged involvement in a series of crimes, criminal association, threat, sexual harassment and extortion. Democratic organizations and entities qualify these as "slanderous accusations."
He was sent to the Regional Recovery Center of Altamira (CRRALT), where Regivaldo Pereira Galvão, known as "Taradão", one of the principals of the cowardly murder of Dorothy Stang, a missionary who defended the right to land of small extractive communities, on February 12, 2005 in Anapu.
José de Sousa, a priest of the parish of Santa Luzia de Anapu since 1998, has been denouncing the crimes of landowners, henchmen and officials of the old State who act for the benefit of the great landlords and monopolies (natives and foreigners) and was receiving death threats.
In a note, the Pedagogy Student Executive (ExNEPe) repudiates his arrest and says: “The arrest of Father Amaro means an attack on all the fighters of the people, especially those who support and defend the right to land for those who live and work there. His imprisonment is eminently political, a declaration of war by the Federation of Agriculture and Livestock of Pará(FAEPa), entity of the landowners and “ruralists”, making clear that the Judiciary and the Civil Police of Anapu, assuming its character of lackey of the ruling classes of the Brazilian State, fulfilled with the interests of landlords. In a clear guilty plea, FAEPa issued a note in order to "defame" Father Amaro, accusing him of "criminal association and leading champion of the struggle for the land." By exposing the process of political persecution, the note of deep fascist content, still blames the left wing of the Bishops for allying with those who defend the Marxist creeds. According to Mauro Lopes, the Catholic Church had never received an attack as virulent as this.”
Together with the organizatios who attended The II Peasant Meeting of south and southeast of Pará they reaffirm to support the campaign against the arrest of another fighter of the people and solidarity to CPT. All these persecutions are due to the fear of the ruling class on the rise of the masses who advances in their organization and will answer each attack correspondingly.
