On 22 February 2020, Paulo da Silva Filho, known as Paulinho do PT, was killed in Ourilândia do Norte, in the South of Pará, in the Brazilian Amazon region. This is the latest in a series of killings and attacks against families living on Agrarian Reform resettlement lands of the 1200 Farm (Occupation 1200), of which Paulinho do PT was a leader.

Paulo was a trade unionist, a former city councillor in Ourilândia do Norte and a well known land rights defender who helped coordinate struggles for land rights in the South of Pará.

In the morning of 22 February 2020, unidentified individuals killed Paulo da Silva Filho with a shot to the head, in front of his shed in Ourilândia do Norte. There is reason to believe that his killing was a reprisal for his human rights work. Paulinho had previously denounced threats against him to the Prosecutor’s office and Civil Police.

Attacks targeting human rights defenders in Pará, already at historically high levels, have further increased in recent times. Alexandre Coelho Furtado Neto, also of Ocupação 1200, was shot in the chest on 19 October 2019, during an ambush.

Families living on lands that are part of the resettlement process of the Agrarian Reform programme live under threat of constant attacks, killing, torture, imprisonment, arson, property attacks, poisoning by aerial spraying of pesticides and shooting of homes and vehicles. In this context, attacks against camp residents have become common. During the night of 14 April 2019, four armed men shot at the houses of the 70 families who live in the public area of Farm 1200 to intimidate them into fleeing their homes. The land workers and human rights defenders of Ocupação 1200 have been living and working to subsist there since 2006, in spite of a series of violent evictions.

The increase of violence against defenders in the region follows the issuing of state and federal government policies that legitimise land grabbing and violence in rural areas.