Business & Human Rights Resource Centre interviewed Danilo Chammas, lawyer and activist for Justiça nos Trilhos (Justice on the Rails, Brazil). The interview took place during a research mission on corporate legal accountability to São Paulo in March 2015. In the interview, Danilo comments on impacts of the Carajás Project (a large mining project, in northern and northeastern Brazil) on communities and the challenges to protect them. The operation is run by Vale. He comments also on the challenges to holding companies legally accountable for human rights abuses arising from their operations. Danilo’s interview addresses the challenges to ensure that a community can decide on its future when private and state projects affect its members. He also spoke about persecution, surveillance and retaliatory lawsuits against communities and human rights defenders. Finally, sends a message to the international community about the importance of disseminating what happens in Carajás. He recommends that both companies and States should consider the rights of the people impacted by major projects and that they should comply with the law.

To read this interview in its original Portuguese version, click here. To read this interview as a blog, please click here.