The top human rights court in the Western Hemisphere has ordered Brazil to overturn a law granting amnesty for crimes committed under two decades of military dictatorship. In a ruling this week, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights held Brazil responsible for the forced disappearance of 62 alleged Amazonian rebels in the 1970s. The ruling also called on the Brazilian government to stop blocking prosecution for abuses between 1964 to 1985 under Brazil’s 1979 amnesty law. Criméia de Almeida, an activist whose husband disappeared under the dictatorship, hailed the decision.

Criméia de Almeida: “This is very significant, and I hope that, as of this sentence, Brazil may enter a process of re-democratization by getting rid of the authoritarian rubble which has been kept alive during all these years.”