Assault on Brazilian Congress, Presidency and Supreme Court headquarters by thousands of Bolsonaro supporters
Brazilian Congress building. Photo: Mgalves80.
Hundreds of supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro have invaded the National Congress headquarters this Sunday in a massive demonstration calling for a military intervention to oust President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Images broadcast by media outlets such as CNN show numerous demonstrators, mostly dressed in yellow and green T-shirts and Brazilian flags, entering the buildings of the three branches of government: the National Congress, the Planalto Palace and the headquarters of the Federal Supreme Court.
The group, which defends coup theses, has overcome a police barrier and climbed the ramp that gives access to the roof of the buildings of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Many have headed to the presidential seat and to that of the Supreme Court, where they have invaded the plenary of the court.
The demonstrators attacked some vehicles of the Legislative Police, which provides security to the Congress, destroyed the protection barriers and, armed with sticks, confronted the agents who tried to contain, without success, the entrance of the demonstrators to the place.
BREAKING 🇧🇷: Bolsonaristas are invading Congress en masse in Brasilia.
— David Adler (@davidrkadler) January 8, 2023
The Minister of Justice, Flávio Dino, has condemned the facts through a message on Twitter: “This absurd attempt to impose the will by force will not prevail. The Federal District Government assures that there will be reinforcements. And the forces at our disposal are working. I am at the headquarters of the Ministry of Justice,” wrote Dino.
For his part, the president of the Senate and the National Congress, Rodrigo Pacheco, said in a Twitter post that he has spoken by phone with the governor of the Federal District, Ibaneis Rocha, with whom he is in permanent contact. “The governor informed me that he is concentrating the efforts of the entire police apparatus to control the situation. The Federal District’s security forces are involved in the action, in addition to the Legislative Police of the Congress. I vehemently repudiate these anti-democratic acts, which must be urgently submitted to the rigor of the law”, expressed Pacheco.
Lula, who assumed the Presidency of Brazil on December 1, is this weekend on a trip to the city of Araraquara, in Sao Paulo. For his part, former President Bolsonaro has been in the US since December 30, when he left Brazil two days before the end of his mandate.
-Thailand News (TN)
