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Landless protesters trash Brazil Congress http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060607/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/brazil_congress_invaded June 6, 2006 (666) A melee that erupted Tuesday when hundreds of landless farmers demanding agrarian reforms demonstrated at Brazil's Congress injured 20 people, authorities said. Marcos Praxedes, leader of the Movement for the Liberation of the Landless, said 300 demonstrators, armed with sticks and stones, wanted to enter the building peacefully to demand speedier land reforms. Fighting erupted as security agents blocked the way, officials said. Rep. Aldo Rebelo, president of the Chamber of Deputies, Brazil's lower house, said Congress summoned security guards to arrest the protesters and called the army to clear out the building. But after the MLST agreed to leave peacefully he canceled the request for additional security. The hour-long melee left 20 people with minor injuries — both demonstrators and congressional security guards. Hundreds of demonstrators were detained after the scuffle, the police department said without providing precise numbers The presidential press office called the protest an "act of vandalism" that "violates the principles of democracy." The MLST is a splinter group of the Landless Rural Workers' Movement, which for years has conducted high-profile, organized invasions of land it deems unproductive. Under Brazil's 1988 Constitution, unproductive land may be expropriated as long as the owner is compensated. #33#
