RIO DE JANEIRO--Rio de Janeiro's state security chief Monday announced the dismissal of a police colonel accused of sending racist text messages and inciting violence against protesters.
Colonel Fabio Souza de Almeida was the commander of a riot police battalion engaged in combatting street protests that broke out in several cities during the mid-2013 Confederations Cub.
News magazine Veja published extracts from thousands of messages Almeida had sent from late 2013 into 2014.
A trawl of conversations over the WhatsApp phone application found Almeida had made racially-charged comments in praising his own group as "a pure and faultless race" and had called for the "weeding out" of colleagues who had not taken specialist courses.
He is also alleged to have urged a violent crackdown on anarchist marchers known as Black Blocs.
After verifying the content of some of the messages, Rio state security secretary Jose Mariano Beltrame ordered the colonel be sacked, web news portal G1 reported.
"Colonel Fabio Souza de Almeida has been dismissed and will be replaced by Colonel Wilman Rene Goncalves Alonso," a spokesman told AFP.
Alonso would continue to serve as head of special operations, the spokesman said.
AFP
