Home About Articles Contact

Gabriela Sá Pessoa

Freelance journalist based in São Paulo, Brazil

Top Stories

AP News •

Musk's X to be reinstated in Brazil after complying with Supreme Court demands

SAO PAULO (AP) — The Brazilian Supreme Court’s Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Tuesday authorized the restoration of social media platform X´s service in Brazil, over a month after its nationwide shutdown, according to a court document that was made public.Elon Musk’s X was blocked on Aug. 30 in the highly online country of 213 million people — and one of X’s biggest markets, with estimates of its user base ranging from 20 to 40 million. De Moraes ordered the shutdown after a monthslong dispute w...
AP News •

Drought has dried a major Amazon River tributary to its lowest level in over 122 years

MANAUS, Brazil (AP) — One of the Amazon River’s main tributaries has dropped to its lowest level ever recorded, Brazil’s geological service said Friday, reflecting a severe drought that has devastated the Amazon rainforest and other parts of the country. The level of the Negro River at the port of Manaus was at 12.66 meters on Friday, as compared with a normal level of about 21 meters. It is the lowest since measurements started 122 years ago. The previous record low level was recorded last year...
revista piauí - _pra quem tem um clique a mais •

A vida em Marçal City - revista piauí

Duas pistas da Avenida Chucri Zaidan, na Zona Sul de São Paulo, foram fechadas. Em frente ao Edifício Jornalista Roberto Marinho, sede paulista da TV Globo, carros, motos e ônibus se espremiam para atravessar um mar de apoiadores estridentes de Pablo Marçal (PRTB). Faltava mais de uma hora para o debate entre os candidatos à prefeitura de São Paulo, o último antes do primeiro turno. O ex-coach, candidato azarão que dominou a pauta da eleição até aqui, havia convidado seus eleitores para recebê-l...
AP News •

X requests it be reinstated in Brazil after complying with judge's orders, sources say

SAO PAULO (AP) — In the high-stakes showdown between the world’s richest man and a Brazilian Supreme Court justice, Elon Musk blinked.Musk’s social media site X has complied with Alexandre de Moraes’ orders and requested its service be reestablished in the country, two sources said Thursday.X complied with orders to block certain accounts from the platform, name an official legal representative in Brazil, and pay fines imposed for not complying with earlier court orders, his lawyers said in a pe...
AP News •

Brazil drought punishes coffee farms and threatens to push prices even higher

CACONDE, Brazil (AP) — Silvio Almeida’s coffee plantation sits at an ideal altitude on a Brazilian hillside, whose clay-rich soil does well at retaining moisture from rainfall and a nearby reservoir. Lately, though, water is scarce on Almeida’s modest farm in Caconde, a town in one of Sao Paulo state’s key growing regions. He can’t get his coffee to grow the way it should.In Brazil, the world’s largest coffee producer, Almeida and other farmers have started grappling with the nation’s worst drou...
AP News •

G20 nations agree to join efforts to fight disinformation and set AI guidelines

SAO PAULO (AP) — Group of 20 leaders agreed Friday to join efforts to fight disinformation and set up an agenda on artificial intelligence as their governments struggle against the speed, scale and reach of misinformation and hate speech.The ministers, who gathered this week in Maceio, the capital of the northeastern state of Alagoas, emphasized in a statement the need for digital platforms to be transparent and “in line with relevant policies and applicable legal frameworks.”It is the first tim...
AP News •

Drought is making Sao Paulo's river emerald green while smoke turns its skies grey

SAO PAULO (AP) — A major river in the Brazilian metropolis of Sao Paulo is suddenly emerald green and clear skies this week turned from blue to grey. In the late afternoon, the sun’s rays filtering through the smoky haze exhibit the color of deep orange.This isn’t a fantasy world: Environmental threats in recent days have transformed the colors of the city’s landscape.The state’s environmental authority attributes the Pinheiros River’s new green hue to an algae bloom, the result of severe drough...
AP News •

On the first day without X, many Brazilians say they feel disconnected from the world

SAO PAULO (AP) — The blocking of social media platform X in Brazil divided users and politicians over the legitimacy of the ban, and many Brazilians on Saturday had difficulty and doubts over navigating other social media in its absence.The shutdown of Elon Musk’s platform started early Saturday, making it largely inaccessible on both the web and through mobile apps after the billionaire refused to name a legal representative to the country, missing a deadline imposed by Supreme Court Justice Al...
AP News •

Brazilian moms are leading the charge to secure CBD for sick kids

SAO PAULO (AP) — The 4-year-old boy struggled to balance while walking through the living room. His mother’s eyes attentively followed his every move. Then a seizure knocked him to the ground, the dull thud of his small body echoing through the home.On this July morning in Guaruja, a coastal city in Brazil’s state of Sao Paulo, Murillo quickly regained his senses as his mom, Janaína Silva, cradled him.“From five minutes of agony, it’s now just seconds,” Silva said, recalling how only three month...
AP News •

Masked assailants ransack Venezuela opposition leader's headquarters as post-election tensions mount

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — A half dozen masked assailants ransacked the headquarters of Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado in the latest escalation of violence against opponents of Nicolás Maduro following the country’s disputed presidential election.The raid occurred at around 3 a.m., Machado’s party said, adding that the assailants broke down doors and hauled away valuable documents and equipment. Images published by Machado’s party on social media show several walls covered in b...
AP News •

Brazil's Pantanal wetlands fire season hasn't officially started but it's already breaking records

SAO PAULO (AP) — Brazil’s massive Pantanal wetlands haven’t technically entered annual fire season, but already the number of blazes has broken records and is leading experts to predict this year will be the most devastating in decades.

Typically dry out and are prone to fires But the National Space Research Institute’s satellites spotted over 2,500 fires in the region in June alone -- by far the most ever recorded for the month in data going back to 1998. It’s more than six times the amount in
AP News •

Outraged Brazilian women stage protests against bill to equate late abortions with homicide

SAO PAULO (AP) — Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of Sao Paulo on Saturday as protests sweep across Brazil in opposition to a bill that would further criminalize abortions. If passed, the law would equate the termination of a pregnancy after 22 weeks with homicide.

The bill, proposed by conservative lawmakers and heading for a vote in the lower house, would also apply in cases of rape. Critics say those who seek an abortion so late are mostly child rape victims, as their pregnanci
Valor Econômico •

Área do Nordeste se torna definitivamente árida

As mudanças climáticas já fizeram com que o clima do norte na Bahia mudasse de vez. Uma região da Caatinga de 5,7 mil km2, na divisa com Pernambuco, se tornou definitivamente árida - a primeira do país, mostra um estudo recente do Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (Inpe) e do Centro Nacional de Monitoramento e Alertas de Desastres Naturais (Cemaden). Agora, produtores rurais e cientistas somam esforços para adaptar espécies e evitar os riscos de desertificação, o que tornaria essas terra
AP News •

A second scourge is battering Brazil's flooded south: Disinformation

SAO PAULO (AP) — While flooding that has devastated Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state has yet to subside, another scourge has spread across the region: disinformation on social media that has hampered desperate efforts to get aid to hundreds of thousands in need.

Among fake postings that have stirred outrage: That official agencies aren’t conducting rescues in Brazil’s southernmost state. That bureaucracy is holding up donations of food, water and clothing. One persistent rumor contends that aut
AP News •

Caramelo, the Brazilian horse stranded on a roof by floods, is rescued after stirring the nation

CANOAS, Brazil (AP) — A Brazilian horse nicknamed Caramelo by social media users garnered national attention after a television news helicopter filmed him stranded on a rooftop in southern Brazil, where massive floods have killed more than 100 people .

About 24 hours after he was first spotted and with people clamoring for his rescue, a team in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state on Thursday successfully removed Caramelo, providing a dose of hope to a beleaguered region.

The brown horse had been
AP News •

Too much water, and not enough: Brazil's flooded south struggles to access basic goods

PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil (AP) — The mayor of a major city in southern Brazil on Tuesday pleaded with residents to comply with his water rationing decree, given that some four-fifths of the population is without running water, a week after major flooding that has left at least 90 people dead and more than 130 others missing.

Efforts were continuing to rescue people stranded by the floods in the , as more rains were forecast for the region into next week. The capital, Porto Alegre, has been virtually
AP News •

Revival of vinyl records in Brazil spares a 77-year-old singer – and others – from oblivion

SAO PAULO (AP) — It took almost a half century for Brazilian singer Cátia de França to find her audience, but she finally has — with the help of a near-obsolete audio technology.

Born in Paraíba, a state in Brazil’s poor northeast region, 77-year-old de França’s blend of psychedelic rock with traditional rhythms and modernist poetry long went overlooked, even as she toured the nation in the 1970s and ‘80s.

During the pandemic, she retreated to a conservation area in the mountains above , “wher
AP News •

What to know about Elon Musk's 'free speech' feud with a Brazilian judge

SAO PAULO (AP) — Headline-grabbing billionaire Elon Musk is clashing with a in Brazil over free speech, far-right accounts and misinformation on X, the social media platform Musk bought when it was Twitter.

Since his many of Twitter’s policies, and transformed what people see on the site. As its owner and perhaps most influential user, he’s also used it to try to sway political discourse around the world. His latest entanglement is inside the nation of 203 million people that has the largest po
AP News •

Brazil Supreme Court strikes down military intervention thesis in symbolic vote for democracy

SAO PAULO (AP) — unanimously voted Monday that the armed forces have no constitutional power to intervene in disputes between government branches, a largely symbolic decision aimed at bolstering democracy after years of increasing threat of military intervention.

The court’s decision came in response to an argument that and his allies deployed in recent years. They have claimed that Article 142 of Brazil’s Constitution affords the military so-called “moderating power” between the executive, leg
AP News •

A Rio councilwoman's killing was a mystery. An arrest gave a peek at corruption keeping it unsolved

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Two days after Rio de Janeiro city councilwoman , her widow sat down with the chief of the state’s civil police, Rivaldo Barbosa, who pledged to do everything in his power to hold the guilty parties to account.

In fact, the man Veja magazine once exalted as “Rio’s Sherlock” had the exact opposite intent, according to newly revealed allegations. Federal Police arrested Barbosa on March 24 — over six years later — for allegedly helping orchestrate Franco’s killing and taking
AP News •

Brazilian police arrest suspected masterminds behind the killing of councilwoman-turned-icon

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s federal police arrested two men Sunday for allegedly ordering the killing of a popular Rio de Janeiro councilwoman in 2018, a long-awaited step after years of society clamoring for justice.

The assassination of Marielle Franco, a 38-year-old city councilwoman, in a drive-by shooting shook Brazil profoundly and reverberated around the world. She stood out as one of the only Black women on the council and was also bisexual. Her assertiveness and mere presence ruffle
Load More

Hello, there!

I am an investigative journalist working as a freelance reporter in Sao Paulo for The Associated Press, revista piauí, and other outlets. My works have been published by The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, BBC, UOL, and Folha de S.Paulo. I have also done research and fact-checking for documentaries. I was the 2023 IWMF Elizabeth Neuffer Fellow at MIT Center for International Studies, The Boston Globe and The New York Times. 

Jornalista investigativa e pesquisadora. Trabalho como freelancer em São Paulo para a Associated Press, revista piauí e outros veículos.  Já tive trabalhos publicados no The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, BBC, UOL e Folha de S.Paulo. Também tenho experiêcia com pesquisa e checagem para audiovisual. Em 2023, vivi nos EUA como IWMF Elizabeth Neuffer Fellow, em uma temporada no MIT, The Boston Globe e New York Times.

Twitter - Instagram - Facebook