BRASILIA, May 31 (Reuters) - Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva approved a plan on Thursday to beef up regional police forces and authorize the use of special national security troops in Brazil's 11 most violent cities.

A justice ministry spokeswoman said the plan, crafted by Justice Minister Tarso Genro, will now be presented to the 11 cities -- including Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and the capital city of Brasilia -- and opened to public debate for the next 30 days.

The finance and planning ministries have yet to earmark funding for the plan, which proposes sending in the paramilitary National Public Security Force, hiring more state police officers, improving training, raising police base pay and building prisons for women and youths.

Rio de Janeiro has already requested and received national security troops to help quell a wave of violence that has swept the beachside tourist city in recent months, but that did little to rein in the bloodshed.

Seventeen people have been killed over the past month in just one slum -- the Vila Cruzeiro shantytown occupied by police since May 1, and 56 people have been wounded, most of them innocent residents shot by stray bullets. Five schools in the area have been shut since the start of the month.

Rio's violence, which reached shocking proportions even for a city used to daily gunfights between drug gangs and police, provoked a national debate about crime in Brazil, while Rio's state governor has requested federal army troops to help patrol city streets.

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