Weekly Report - 11 December 2014 (WR-14-49)

Brazil's national truth commission (CNV) handed its investigation into human rights abuses during country's last military dictatorship to President Dilma Rousseff on 10 December. In a ceremony in Brasília, Rousseff, who was herself held prisoner and tortured during the period of military rule, said that Brazilians “deserved to know the truth” about what happened during that time. While Rousseff was warmly applauded for her emotional speech, what comes next will be even more difficult. The government will now have to decide whether to follow the commission’s recommendation to prosecute the 190 or so torturers who are still alive. Their average age is 82.