DOI-CODI

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The Destacamento de Operações de Informações - Centro de Operações de Defesa Interna (English: Department of Operations of Information - Center for Internal Defense Operations) was the Brazilian intelligence and repression agency during the military period called "Anos de Chumbo". This period started in March 31, 1964 with the removal of the civilian government by military forces and ended in the 1980s with the free election of a civilian president. DOI-CODI was responsible for suppressing internal dissent against the regime. It acted as a political police, using torture and other counter-insurgency methods, with a focus on anti-communism. Several political activists, intellectuals, artists, university students and journalists, mostly accused of being communists, were interrogated and at times tortured by the DOI-CODI throughout its existence in a dirty war against clandestine forces and guerrilla groups.

The first DOI unit started in São Paulo as a private organization called "OBAN - Bandeirant Operation" (Operação Bandeirante - OBAN; OBAN was an illegal organization created using members of the federal police, civil state polices, militar state polices and select members of the armed forces. It was financed by private and corporate entities.

Each state had a DOI Unit subordinated to CODI, which had the role of centralizing the operations. The DOI units' composition mirrored that of the previous OBAN.

The largest DOI-CODI, that of São Paulo, had at its peak nearly 250 agents, occupying a large building on Tutóia street. The building gained the infamous nickname of "Tutóia Hilton" (after the Hanoi Hilton of Vietnam) due to the extensive torture which took place in its basement.

[edit] See also

ABIN (Agência Brasileira de Inteligência) - Brazilian Intelligence Agency
SNI (Serviço Nacional de Informações) - National Information Service
DOPS (Departamento de Ordem Politica e Social) - Department of Social and Political Order
Araguaya guerrilla (Guerrilha do Araguaia)
1975 assassination of Vladimir Herzog