RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — Hundreds of people joined the parents of slain French citizens for a Mass honouring the aid workers yesterday.Delphine Douyere, Christian Doupes and Jerome Faure were killed on Tuesday near Copacabana beach by assailants who apparently wanted to protect a Brazilian accountant accused of stealing money from their non-governmental aid organisation.

Douyere’s and Doupes’ parents — who arrived in Brazil on Friday to take care of the couple’s two-year-old son — attended the Mass, as did Rio de Janeiro State Security Secretary Jose Mariano Beltrame and France’s general consul in Rio, Hugues Goisbault.

Dozens of Rio teenagers helped by the French’s nonprofit group also joined the crowd at the church in the Lagoa district in Rio’s posh south side.

The parents did not speak to reporters, but said in a letter read at the altar that “the love of our kids for Brazil could be measured by the hard work of the non-governmental organisation Terr’Ativa, which helped over 1,000 poor children and teenagers from the poorest communities in Rio de Janeiro.”

Faure’s parents, who remained in France, also sent a letter thanking everyone for their support and prayers.

On Saturday, a Brazilian judge authorised the grandparents to take the couple’s son, Max, back to France, the Agencia Estado news service said. The child had been staying with his parents’ friends in Rio de Janeiro.

The grandparents were expected to stay in Brazil until Thursday arranging to repatriate the bodies to France.

Douyere, 36, and Doupes, 42, were the directors of Terr’Ativa — roughly translated from Portuguese as Active Earth — an organisation working to improve education for children and adolescents from poor Rio communities. Faure, 38, worked for the nonprofit group.

Police say the group’s accountant, Tarsio Wilson Ramires, confessed to the killings because he had been accused of bilking money from the group and wanted to cover up his actions.

Ramires and two other men — also arrested — donned masks and put on surgical gloves before stabbing the aid workers to death, police said.

Rio has been hit by successive waves of brutal killings over the last several months. Less than a month ago, five young men and teenagers stole a car and dragged to death a six-year-old boy who got stuck in his seat belt while trying to escape.

Most of Rio’s killings are confined to city’s vast shantytowns, but the killings of the French nationals happened in an upscale art deco building less than a block from the beach.