Brazil saw an alarming rise in racial abuse, sexual assault, femicide and violence against women and LGBT people in 2018, according to new figures released on Tuesday.

The data illustrates a country which became more bigoted and more polarised against the backdrop of last year’s incendiary election campaign and the increase in inflammatory rhetoric by the far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, and his supporters, specialists said.

“We are observing a rise in violence against women in all forms: aggression, femicide and rape,” said Samira Bueno, executive director of the Brazilian Public Security Forum, which published the figures using state and federal government data.

Intentional violent deaths – which include homicides, robberies leading to death, deaths of police officers – fell by 10% in 2018 to 57,341. Murders of police officers also fell – from 373 to 343.

But femicides rose by more than 4% to 1,206.

A total of 66,041 incidents of sexual violence were reported in 2018, of which 82% were against women and girls, a 4.1% rise on the previous year and the highest number ever registered. More than half of the female victims were girls under 13.

With 263,067 domestic violence injuries reported, the figures indicated a woman was attacked in Brazil every two minutes. Read more via the Guardian