Brazil has one of the world's worst telephone systems, but Brazilian, Mr Francisco de Assis Ferreira Neto, stopped complaining the day his cellular telephone connected with a stray bullet headed for his chest.

"This is the lucky telephone. Thanks to it I'm alive," Mr Neto (48) said.

The taxi driver had been riding a bus in downtown Rio de Janeiro when a stray bullet from a failed robbery shot through an open window and lodged in the cellular telephone he was carrying inside a leather briefcase under his arm.

"The thief shot and fled. It was then that I felt the impact," Mr Neto said.

He looked inside his case and found his cellular telephone twisted out of shape with a 38-calibre bullet wedged between the keypad and the battery.