Rio de Janeiro - Rio, a city known for carnival parades that feature nearly naked shimmying women, is set to get its first nude beach.
A final court ruling in a nearly decade-long legal battle ended with a victory for people who like to sun bathe in the buff when a Brazilian court gave the green light to the establishment of a nudist beach in Abrico in western Rio de Janeiro, news reports said Wednesday.
In justifying the ruling the court cited a recent newspaper poll in which 53 percent of the people asked supported the idea of a nude beach in Rio de Janeiro.
The city's environmental secretary approved the creation of a nude beach in 1994, but opponents managed to block it in court. Even topless sunbathing remained taboo at famous beaches in Ipanema and Copacabana.
To draw attention to the ban, three years ago a woman removed her bikini top while sunbathing and was arrested for "creating a public nuisance". The event received page-one coverage in newspapers. Sapa-DPA