By Clifford Andrew Welch, LAP Editor and Contributing Editor/UNIFESP
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On May 31, Valdir Misnerovicz, an important and effective organizer of the Landless Workers Movement (MST) in Brazil was arrested while teaching a class on agricultural coops in Veranópolis, a city in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul. The arrest did not stem from his lectures, but from his activism. To organize the poor to occupy land in the name of fulfilling Brazil's constitutional mandate to ensure the "social function" of land through its appropriation and distribution among peasants is considered illegal gang activity by the government of Michel Temer, which came to power last month in what many consider to be a coup d'etat. |
