Brazil prison violence kills 7, injures 13

BRASILIA: Seven inmates were killed and 13 injured before dawn Monday in a prison in northeastern Brazil after a rival gang set fire to their cell, authorities said.

The fire was apparently an act of retaliation after one of the prisoners wounded another in front of his family during visiting day on Sunday, authorities said in a statement.

Prisoners said the fight violated an agreement among prisoners to refrain from attacks on visiting day.

Military police entered the prison in Fortaleza and regained control of the facility, which houses more than 1,100 prisoners, most awaiting sentencing, the office of the secretary of justice of Ceara state said.

As in many other Latin American countries, Brazil's prisons are overcrowded, plagued by dilapidated conditions, corrupt officials and criminal gangs that impose their own rules on the inside.