Operation Containment against Comando Vermelho, which became the deadliest police action in Brazilian history with 121 deaths, bears the signature of the governor of Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, Claudio Castro.

At least 121 people died (including four police officers) and 113 were arrested, according to official figures from the Rio de Janeiro Civil and Military Police, who carried out the operation against the Comando Vermelho criminal group on October 28 in the Alemao and Penha favelas in the city of Rio.

“We carried out our operation and it was a success,” Castro stated last Wednesday, October 29, while residents of the two affected favelas continued collecting bodies and lining them up one by one on the ground.

Born into the ranks of the conservative Social Christian Party, the governor of Rio de Janeiro joined the Liberal Party of former president Jair Bolsonaro after the 2018 elections.

For some, he is a lawyer without much charisma who arrived “by accident” at the forefront of politics. For others, he is a politician seeking to gain traction among more conservative voters with an eye toward being elected senator next year.

Daniel Hirata, coordinator of the Group for the Study of New Illegalities at the Federal Fluminense University, defines Castro as an “extreme right-wing” governor who supports repressive measures to combat organized crime.

“The [Castro] government is marked by mass killings. Two-thirds of the major massacres in Rio de Janeiro occurred during his administration. And now, the largest in Brazilian history,” Hirata, who in 2022 described the Rio de Janeiro police as a “killing machine,” tells BBC Mundo.

We tell you who Claudio Castro is and what he is seeking with the deadliest police operation in Rio de Janeiro's history, questioned by human rights organizations and supported by 57% of the city's residents, according to Datafolha.

From Faith to Guanabara

Under the open arms of the iconic Christ the Redeemer statue, located atop Rio de Janeiro's Corcovado Mountain, Claudio Castro sang "I know you take care of me" earlier this year, gazing at the sky.

Born in the state of Sao Paulo and raised in Rio de Janeiro, this 46-year-old lawyer is linked to the Charismatic Renewal movement within the Catholic Church, a branch of Catholicism with several points of contact with evangelical churches.

During his tenure as governor, Castro is known for combining a tough security policy against organized crime with religious preaching through music.

"This generation needs to know the importance of doing good, respecting others, and following in the footsteps of Jesus," Castro wrote on Instagram after participating in an evangelical gathering organized by the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God.

Castro's faith finds a home in the country with the largest Catholic population in the world and some 47 million evangelical believers, according to data from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics.

From this background, Castro arrived at Guanabara Palace, the seat of the Rio de Janeiro state government, with the support of his predecessor, Governor Wilson Witzel, a right-wing politician known for his hardline policies against organized crime.

According to the Federal Fluminense University's Map of Armed Groups, the Comando Vermelho was the only criminal organization that expanded its territorial control in the state in recent years.

After serving as a city councilman in Rio de Janeiro, Castro reached the forefront of Rio de Janeiro politics in 2018, when he was elected vice-governor on the ticket headed by the conservative Wilson Witzel.

Castro became governor "by accident," after Witzel was sidelined. from his post in August 2020, accused of allegedly accepting millions in bribes in exchange for awarding public contracts.

Those corruption allegations, which also implicated Castro, led the vice-governor to assume Witzel's position, first on an interim basis in 2020 and then in 2022 when he was re-elected with 58% of the vote.

Those who know him describe Castro as a "behind-the-scenes politician," an "expressive" figure without the charisma of traditional politicians, who seeks to consolidate his support among Catholic voters and evangelical leaders.

Relationship with Bolsonaro

Claudio Castro came to power as a city council candidate for the conservative Social Christian Party, but in 2021 he switched to the Liberal Party of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.

Like Bolsonaro,Castro, who was sentenced last September to 27 years in prison for attempted coup, belongs to the family of politicians most critical of organized crime.

“Either we toughen legislation as other places in the world have done, or we're going to have this mix of Mexico and Colombia, as Brazil is becoming in the area of ??public security,” Castro told local journalists in 2023.

At that time, Castro even sent a package of measures to Congress to toughen punishments against criminal gangs, including harsher penalties for people arrested with weapons of war.

“Criminals will not have an easy life in Rio. We are going to continue fighting to take them off the streets, arrest them, send their leaders to federal prisons, so they can't command crime from inside the prisons,” the governor told the press at the time.

However, after aligning himself with the Bolsonaro family, Castro strategically distanced himself from the former president to gain In 2022, some of the votes were disillusioned with the Workers' Party (PT).

For Hirata, Castro is a governor who doesn't plan security policies, but rather carries out police operations with a high media impact that often end in a very high number of deaths.

After last week's operation, Castro received the support of the Bolsonaro family.

“It is a moral duty to support Governor Castro. This isn't politics. If you don't have the courage to openly support the fight against crime for fear of being labeled a radical, then you are worse than a rat,” wrote Eduardo Bolsonaro, son of the former Brazilian president, in X.

Support from the Governors

Despite the harsh criticism Castro received from the opposition and human rights organizations in Brazil, the top political authority in Rio de Janeiro was not isolated.

After the events, Castro met with six conservative governors from Brazil, including representatives from the country's most populated and wealthiest districts, such as Sao Paulo and Minas Gerais.

Together they announced the creation of the so-called Peace Consortium, an entity to integrate their policies for combating organized crime and circumvent the security policy of the government of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, which they consider ineffective.

“We came to Rio de Janeiro to congratulate its authorities on this operation, carried out without the support of the government. A government [of Lula da Silva] that insists on not combating crime and on not considering criminal groups that control territories as terrorists,” said the governor of Minas Gerais, Romeu Zema.

For his part,Castro emphasized that the proposal comes at a time of intense pressure on his government following the operation that resulted in over a hundred deaths and several arrests.

“We are not in a position to win this war alone. A war against a parallel state that grows stronger every day, with ever-increasing military and financial power,” Castro told the press the day after the operation.

According to analysts, this type of operation tends to “pay off” politically and “gain votes,” especially when charisma is not a strong point.

“It is a very well-established, traditional, and effective strategy, since a considerable portion of the population approves of and supports this type of action,” says the coordinator of the research group at the Federal Fluminense University.

According to an AtlasIntel poll from last Friday, 87% of residents of Rio de Janeiro's favelas approve of the operation ordered by Castro.

In that sense, the action The governor's crackdown on the Comando Vermelho can be interpreted as a platform for Castro a year before the October 2026 general elections, in which he will seek to run for senator. Beyond the electoral disputes, the public support for Operation Containment highlights the urgency of the debate on how the State should respond to the fear and pain of those who live daily with the most tragic effects of violence. Click here to read more stories from BBC News Mundo. Subscribe here to our new newsletter to receive a selection of our best content of the week every Friday. You can also follow us on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, X, Facebook, and our WhatsApp channel. And remember that you can receive notifications in our app. Download the latest version and activate them.87% of residents in Rio de Janeiro's favelas approve of the operation ordered by Castro.

In this sense, the governor's actions against Comando Vermelho can be interpreted as a platform for Castro a year before the October 2026 general elections, in which he will seek to run for senator.

Beyond the electoral disputes, the social support for Operation Containment highlights the urgency of the debate on how the State should respond to the fear and pain of those who live daily with the most tragic effects of violence.

Click here to read more stories from BBC News Mundo.

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