The numerous reports of violent attacks by large landowners and their henchmen against poor and landless peasants who either have to fight for a piece of land or defend their hard-won land against these forces show the sad normality and continuity of the reactionary terror under which poor peasants throughout Brazil have to live.

On December 18, another such incident occurred.The inhabitants of the community of Marielle Franco in the south of the Brazilian state of Amazonas were once again attacked by gunmen and large landowners. This time it turned out that the gunmen were civilian police acting on behalf of the large landowners.

What such an attack looks like is described by one of the peasants, who hid in a bush and described the incident afterwards. The peasant says that throughout the afternoon, the landowners, accompanied by the civilian policemen, had been shooting around with live weapons, obstructing people collecting chestnuts and then threatening local residents.

Also on December 18, peasants in the state of Pernambucano gathered on the site of a former mill to force the large landowner Guilherme Maranhão, owner of the agricultural company "Agropecuária Mata Sul" and representatives of the US-American NGO "Save Brazil" out of the area, which is considered a private environmental protection area. When representatives of the large landowner and his Yankee NGO arrived in the area with 8 cars at around 14:30, they were surprised by the protests of the peasants, who were already waiting for them with fireworks and had set up barricades on the roads through the forest area. The peasants had also brought a huge banner with the slogan "GUILHERME MARANHÃOR OUT ! DESTROYER OF NATURE AND PEASANT LIFE!". Visibly surprised by the peasants' protest action, the landowner's cohort and the US researchers had to abandon their visit and flee under the protection of armed men disguised as private security guards.

This action was preceded by several legal disputes between the agricultural company Agropecuária Mata Sul and poor peasants, in which the landowner's company filed lawsuits against hundreds of peasant families who had been working and living on their land for more than a hundred years. The pretext for these expropriation lawsuits is the accusation that the peasants are illegally invading environmental protection areas. This is also the purpose of the Yankee NGO "Save Brazil", which submitted a report in the interests of the large landowners to prove the alleged damaging influence of the peasants on the environmental protection area. This is based on a deal between the US non-governmental organization and the large landowners. The Yankee researchers provide the courts with expert opinions that reflect the interests of the large landowners and brand the peasants as a threat to the environment and nature, in return for which they are given part of the land for biological studies, while another part of the land can be used by the agricultural company for eucalyptus plantations.  In between the proceedings, the said landowner, Guilherme Maranhão, then ordered his armed lackeys, with the support of civil and military police, to poison the peasants' water wells with pesticides, drive the peasants' cattle near roads and churches, install electric fences and criminalize the leaders of the protesting peasants.

But the direct and organized action of the peasants shows, as in other cases we have reported, that the poor peasants in Brazil are more and more willing to go into direct confrontation with their class enemies and their lackeys in order to conquer their right to a piece of land. The latest reports and translations published here show not only an increase in the intensity of the struggle between the poor peasantry and the big landowners and the old Brazilian state, but also that this struggle is taking place all over Brazil. We will certainly be reporting more on this struggle and its successes in the future and also in the new year.

All pictures are taken from the following source: https://anovademocracia.com.br/pe-camponeses-impedem-visita-de-ong-ianque-e-latifundiario-ladrao-de-terras-em-reserva-ambiental/