Police arrest one of Brazil’s most wanted drug traffickers

SAO PAULO – Police say one of Brazil’s most wanted drug and arms traffickers has been arrested in neighbouring Paraguay.

Rio de Janeiro’s State Security Department says in a statement that Marcelo Fernando Pinheiro Veiga was arrested Wednesday in the Paraguayan city of Encarnacion.

The statement says that the man also known as Marcelo Piloto had been living for years in the city from which he co-ordinated the shipment of drugs, arms, ammunition and explosives to organized crime groups in the slums of Rio de Janeiro.

He is also accused of murder and robbery.

His arrest comes one week after police captured drug boss Rogerio Avelino da Silva, who oversaw drug trafficking operations in the Rio slum of Rocinha, one of Brazil’s largest.