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Brazilian authorities have indicted ex-president Jair Bolsonaro, accusing him of “full knowledge” of a 2022 plot to kill his successor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and overturn the results of the presidential election.
Earlier this week, Brazilian police arrested five people, including a former adviser to Bolsonaro, over the alleged plots. The coup plotters also envisaged the assassination of Lula’s Vice President Geraldo Alckmin and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the Supreme Court said in its arrest order.
In October 2022, Lula narrowly beat Bolsonaro in the presidential election. Bolsonaro’s supporters rejected the results and rioted in the capital Brasilia, storming government buildings on January 8, 2023.
According to the police warrant carried out on Tuesday, Bolsonaro allegedly met with officials from the army and navy as well as the minister of defense in December 2022 to present a document detailing the legal framework that would keep him in power.
The former president has repeatedly denied allegations of attempting a coup. His son, Flavio Bolsonaro, who is a senator in the Brazilian Congress, suggested in a post on X that the five suspects arrested this week had not committed a crime.
“As disgusting as it may be to think about killing someone, it is not a crime. And for there to be an attempt, the execution must be interrupted by some situation beyond the control of the perpetrators. Which does not appear to have happened,” he wrote.
This is a developing story and will be updated.