The company formally known as Blackwater is helping provide security training in Brazil in the run up to the 2014 World Cup, stoking fears that the ‘pacification’ of the country’s slums is very much an Iraq-style military occupation.
According to the daily Folha D. S. Paulo, Blackwater, renamed "Xe Services" in 2009 and "Academi" in 2011, has been instructing Brazilian security forces at one of its private training facilities in North Carolina.
In a country that clocks up 50,000 murders a year, securing the $11-13 billion World Cup – the most expensive ever, is of primary importance. Violent anti-government protests erupted across Brazil last year, with demonstrators questioning why billions will be spent hosting the World Cup and the 2016 Rio Olympics rather than on vital public services.