Brazil prison riots leave 14 dead

Prison riots in northeast Brazil left 14 inmates dead last weekend, officials said Monday.

The riots broke out during a strike by prison guards, local media reported, pitting rival groups of inmates against each other at two prisons in the state of Ceara.

"I deeply regret what has been happening in our penitentiaries and will spare no effort, together with our security forces, to ensure stability in the prison system as quickly as possible," Governor Camilo Santana said in a Facebook post.

He called for reinforcements from the elite National Security Force.

State prison officials said they were still investigating the reason for the deadly brawls, which they said had been brought under control by Monday.

Police and guards found a makeshift tunnel in one prison, "but there are no confirmed escapes," they said.

The striking prison guards have since returned to work.

Brazil's prisons are massively overcrowded havens for criminal gangs. Human Rights Watch recently called them a "human rights disaster."