Fernando Gabeira is one of the highest-profile environmental advocates in Brazil’s Congress. Representing Rio de Janeiro state in the Chamber of Deputies, he has helped lead opposition to construction of a third reactor at the Angra dos Reis nuclear-power complex south of Rio and to legislation aimed at easing curbs on land-clearing in the Amazon. A journalist during the early years of Brazil’s former military regime, Gabeira became an urban guerrilla in the late 1960s. He took part in the 1969 kidnapping of U.S. Ambassador Charles Elbrick, who was freed in exchange for the release of guerrillas from prison. Soon after, Gabeira was captured, jailed and tortured, then exiled in 1970. Returning in 1979, he wrote a best-selling novel based on his experience that was turned into a film in 1997. In 1986, he co-founded Brazil’s Green Party. But last August, Gabeira switched to the opposition Workers Party (PT), whose likely candidate in Brazil’s October presidential elections—Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva—leads preference polls. EcoAméricas correspondent Bernd Radowitz spoke with Gabeira in Rio de Janeiro. [Log in to read more]

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