Violence persists in Sao Paulo

Sao Paulo has seen continued violence over the weekend as police and gangs carry out a continued gun battle.

It is thought that over 170 people have been killed in the last week alone as prison riots escalated into violence across the city against the police.

Police have been accused of exacerbating the violence by targeting innocent civilians in revenge for the attacks on fellow officers.

Lawyer Carlos Veiss told the BBC: "On this moment we are facing a sort of explosion. Policemen in their cars with their guns going to poor neighbourhoods and facing people with a face like criminals and shooting them."

It is believed that the initial violence was sparked when a gang known as the First Command of the Capital (PCC) attacked and murdered a number of police officers in the city last week.

However, despite the claims from human rights campaigners that the police have reacted with excessive force, the head of the military police has denied these accusations in an interview with the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper, in which he claimed: "All the deaths happened during counter-attacks by the police. This is clear from the incident reports."