The Swedish owner of a hostel called Alto Vidigal in a Rio de Janeiro slum was found dead over the weekend, police said, prompting a murder probe in Vidigal, one of the city's most-visited shantytowns and a cornerstone of a local campaign to pacify the historically violent neighborhoods, according to Reuters.
The death is being investigated as a homicide, police said, Reuters reported.They declined to detail how the victim might have died or whether they had any suspects.
Police responded to a call on Saturday in Vidigal, a steep and scenic slum that rises above some of Rio's most popular beaches and in recent years has enjoyed a spike in tourism and investments by entrepreneurs eager to accommodate it, according to Reuters.
One of Rio's best known favelas, as the slums are known, Vidigal has long illustrated the stark social and economic divides present in Brazil's second-largest city, Reuters reported.
Inside the Alto Vidigal guest house, officers found the body of Mille Ballai Miuta, an Iranian-born Swedish citizen, Reuters reported. At present, police said, they are looking for witnesses who might be able to help the investigation.
Despite Vidigal's privileged location and proximity to some of the most expensive real estate in Brazil, the neighborhood was wracked by poverty and crime, lacking law enforcement and other public services, according to Reuters.
Sweden's consul in Rio referred questions about the death to the Swedish embassy in the capital, Brasilia, but officials at the embassy could not be reached, Reuters reported.
Rio's state and municipal government in recent years sought to improve favelas through a "pacification" process, whereby police have occupied dozens of slums and expelled the drug traffickers who once controlled them, according to Reuters.
Residents in many favelas had also complained of police intimidation and abuse, and were dissatisfied because many of the public investments that were meant to follow pacification, from schools to health clinics to basic sewerage service, had not materialized, Reuters reported.
Despite initial success for the process, traffickers in some favelas have fought back over the past year, killing more than a dozen police officers in pacified areas and raising questions about the long-term sustainability of the effort, according to Reuters.
