E/CN.4/1996/72/Add.1 page 13 responsibility except in Parliament (there is a total of 11 Afro-Brazilian deputies out of 513 in Congress) and at the Palmares Cultural Foundation, whose purpose is precisely to restore the image of Blacks and to combat the discrimination from which they suffer? 16/ 40. There is a colour hierarchy in Brazil and there seems to be little doubt that a very dark colour is a handicap to social advancement. It is difficult for a Black to become a senior civil servant; he will require far more talent and effort than if his skin were lighter. Brazil does not classify people into races on the basis of juridical definitions or scientific theories; it classifies them on the basis of their physical appearance and the colour of their skin. Thus, Brazilians are not divided among themselves because between the whitest White and the blackest Black there is a whole range of nuances that reduces friction. Nevertheless, there is a degree of structural segregation on account of economic and social conditions. Thus, what most separates so-called Coloured people from Whites is a difference in their standard of living and way of life; the class barrier, which is easy to discern, thus matches the very real but more subtle colour barrier. B. Everyday racism and racial discrimination 41. Everyday racism and racial discrimination take the form of acts of harassment which accentuate the inferiority of Blacks. For example, in luxury buildings and apartment blocks, Blacks are asked to use only service entrances and lifts. A cartoon strip produced by the "Conselho de Desenvolvimento da Comunidade Negra" of the State of Bahia 17/ depicts how Blacks may be denied access to public places such as "high-class" nightclubs; in supermarkets, they are frequently suspected of theft; they may be refused a room in a luxury hotel. If a Black is noticed in a residential district at night by a police patrol he is immediately asked to present his identity documents and to justify his presence there, as Blacks are supposed to live only in the favelas and on the outskirts of towns. 42. Blacks are frequently harassed by the military and civilian police or by other law-enforcement agencies. Such harassment may extend to doubting that a Black can be a police officer: the experience of Alexandre Silva de Souza, an investigator with the Anti-Drug-Trafficking Division in the State of Pará, is a revealing case in point. In December 1994 in the town of Belem, this black police officer, who was on plain-clothes duty, got on to a bus and showed his police badge in order to be exempted from buying a ticket, as police officers are entitled to do. The driver then said to him "You don’t look like a police officer, you look more like a bandit; that badge is a fake." Shortly after, the bus stopped in front of a prison (Sao José) where the driver called over to some military police, saying: "There’s a Black in this bus who’s pretending to be a police officer." Four soldiers got on to the bus and immediately started to beat up Alexandre de Souza who shouted that he was a police officer and that he would show them his identity documents. They then took him away and continued to beat him inside the prison. He was only saved by the arrival of a radio patrol policeman (Radio Patrulha) who took him away for an identity check to the police control office. 18/