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A Tuesday police raid targeting a drug gang in the low-income settlements of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, resulted in the deaths of at least 117 suspects and four policemen, officials said Wednesday, a significantly higher death count than the one initially reported by Brazilian police. Felipe Curi, the state police secretary, said more bodies had been uncovered in woods from which they were fighting against law enforcement. Roughly 50 bodies were also recovered by residents of the Penha and Complexo de Alemao favelas, who displayed them in Penha’s main square while shouting “massacre,” and “justice.” Officials also said 113 suspects from the Red Command gang had been arrested, with 90 rifles and more than a ton of drugs also recovered. Rio state Gov. Claudio Castro said Wednesday the operation had been a “success” in what he has characterized as a war against “narco-terrorists,” while insisting all civilians killed had been criminals. The death toll from Hurricane Melissa, currently making its way through the Caribbean, rose to more than 30 people as of this morning. Haitian officials said there had been 25 confirmed deaths there, while eight deaths had been reported in Jamaica and one in the Dominican Republic. A hurricane warning remains in effect for parts of Cuba, the Bahamas, and Bermuda. Winds reached 100 miles per hour, with officials warning that a storm surge of 4 to 7 feet is possible for parts of Bermuda. Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness declared the country a disaster area on Wednesday, after Melissa made landfall on Tuesday as the strongest storm in the island’s history. The U.S. Army announced Tuesday that troops from the 101st Airborne Division would not be replaced after their scheduled withdrawal from Romania, Germany, and Poland, raising alarms among supporters of U.S. engagement with NATO. According to the Army’s press release, the departure of the 101st’s 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, comprising roughly 700 soldiers, was “not an American withdrawal from Europe or a signal of lessened commitment to NATO and Article 5,” but a “positive sign of increased European capability and responsibility.” According to Romanian officials, about 1,000 U.S. troops will remain in the country. The Republican chairmen of the House and Senate foreign affairs committees, Rep. Mike Rogers of Alabama and Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, issued a joint statement criticizing the move. “This decision also sends the wrong signal to Russia at the very moment President Trump is applying pressure to force Vladimir Putin to come to the table to achieve a lasting peace in Ukraine,” they said, noting that the White House had not consulted Congress. Videos circulating online and satellite imaging confirmed reports of widespread atrocities in the Sudanese city of El Fasher, which was taken by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) rebel group over the weekend. Satellite images show pools of blood and piles of bodies around the city, and videos show alleged RSF forces—which include child soldiers—murdering prisoners in cold blood. Government-aligned forces who defended the city during an 18-month siege, as well as experts from the Yale School of Public Health Humanitarian Research Lab, say that RSF forces are attempting to ethnically cleanse non-Arab populations from the city. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director of the World Health Organization, said Tuesday that his organization had received reports of 460 people being murdered at a maternity hospital in the city. The total casualties from the ongoing sack are unknown but most likely run into the thousands. The Federal Reserve’s Open Markets Committee cut interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point on Wednesday to a range of 3.75 percent to 4 percent. The vote by the 12-person committee included two dissents. Governor Stephen Miran, who was appointed to the Federal Reserve by U.S. President Donald Trump in September, dissented in favor of a half-percentage-point cut, his second consecutive dissent in favor of looser economic policy. Kansas City Fed President Jeffrey Schmid also dissented, but preferred that the Fed hold rates steady. During his press conference after the meeting, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell told investors not to count on another rate cut at the Fed’s next meeting.
