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Town mourns Brazilian's death
29/07/2005 11:05 - (SA)
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| Maria Otoni de Menezes, 60, mother of Jean Charles de Menezes, is consoled by his coffin in Gonzaga, Brazil. (Silvia Izquierdo, AP) |
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Gonzaga - About 5 000 grief-stricken townspeople mourned on Thursday as a young emigrant electrician, mistaken for a terror suspect by a British policeman who shot him dead, arrived in his Brazilian hometown lifeless in a shiny box.
The body of Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, arrived at the airport in nearby Governador Valadares in Minas Gerais state six days after the deadly error which has sparked fear in highly diverse Britain about ethnic profiling in the aftermath of that country's worst terror strikes.
"This is a loss that all of Brazil has felt," said Luciano Batel da Silva, De Menezes' godfather, whose six youngest children accompanied the casket with a show of blood-red flowers.
Others in the crowd wore black armbands waved Brazilian flags taken up as a protest symbol in Brazil since the killing.
De Menezes' body was flown to Sao Paulo on a Varig flight, accompanied by three cousins with whom he lived in London, and a Brazilian embassy official, a foreign ministry source said. He had been living in London for three years.
The Brazilian air force then flew his body to Governador Valadares, where mourners waited from the early hours to pay their last respects.
Virtually the entire town massed in the streets of Gonzaga, many weeping and waving improvised white flags of surrender.
Signs denouncing "Death by Mistake" and saying "England: don't fight terrorism with terror," could be read along the town's main avenue en route to its only church. It was decked out in the green and gold of the Brazilian flag.
Gonzaga, a small town of about 6 000, has seen more than 1 500 of its residents leave in search of work in Europe and the United States.
Burial was scheduled for Friday, relatives said.
About 100 people staged a protest outside the British consulate in Sao Paulo on Wednesday, many waving signs reading "Shoot to Kill," to protest De Menezes' killing.
As the body arrived in Sao Paulo, Manoel Gomes Pereira, a diplomat who co-ordinates work with Brazilians living abroad, said: "We understand England's concern with the (terror) attacks, but we do not accept that that concern should be allowed to kill innocent people."
He said the victim's family, with the support of the Foreign Ministry, was discussing the issue of compensation for the loss of their son.
De Menezes, who arrived in Britain on March 13 2002, was shot eight times - seven bullets direct to the head - after police followed him from Tulse Hill in south London.
He was gunned down last Friday as he fled from police at Stockwell subway station in south London as they hunted for four suspected would-be suicide bombers following failed bombing attacks the previous day.
In Britain's worst terror strikes July 7 56 people were killed including four suicide bombers.
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