MAURICIO SAVARESE
Mon, March 25, 2024
Brazil's former President Jair Bolsonaro prepares to speak to the press in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, June 30, 2023, the day that judges ruled him ineligible to run for any political office again until 2030 after concluding that he abused his power and cast unfounded doubts on the country's electronic voting system. According to a Federal Police indictment unveiled Tuesday, March 19, 2024, Bolsonaro turned to an aide-de-camp and asked him to insert false data into the public health system to make it appear as though he and his daughter had received the COVID-19 vaccine, in order to have the necessary vaccination certificate required by U.S. authorities for their 2023 trip to Florida.
(AP Photo/Thomas Santos)
SAO PAULO (AP) — Brazil's Federal Police on Monday launched an investigation into former President Jair Bolsonaro's two-night stay last month at the Hungarian embassy in Brasilia, amid widespread speculation from his opponents that he may have been attempting to evade arrest.
A Federal Police source with knowledge of the investigation confirmed to The Associated Press that it was undertaken in response to a report from The New York Times, which featured security camera video of the Hungarian ambassador welcoming Bolsonaro on Feb. 12 and footage of Bolsonaro from the rest of his stay. Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, one of the leaders of a global far-right movement, is a key international ally of his.
The visit took place just days after Federal Police seized Bolsonaro’s Brazilian and Italian passports and raided the homes of his top aides as part of a probe into whether they plotted to ignore 2022 election results and stage an uprising to keep the defeated leader in power.
Bolsonaro has denied wrongdoing regarding this investigation, and multiple others targeting him.
Were the Federal Police to obtain an arrest warrant for the former president, officers would not have jurisdiction to enter the Hungarian embassy due to diplomatic conventions restricting access.
Bolsonaro’s lawyers said in a statement on Monday that there was nothing amiss about his embassy stay.
“In the days he was at the Hungarian embassy, by invitation, the former Brazilian president spoke to countless authorities from the friendly country for updates on the political scenarios of both nations,” his lawyers said in the statement. “Any other interpretations ... constitute an evidently fictional work, with no connection to the reality of the facts.”
Speaking at his party's headquarters in Sao Paulo, Bolsonaro told supporters he gets many calls from Orbán to discuss politics.
“To this day I have a relationship with some heads of state around the world,” Bolsonaro said. “If I had my passport, I would have traveled to Israel.”
Brazil's foreign ministry said in a short statement that it had summoned Hungary's ambassador Miklos Halmai to explain why Bolsonaro was his guest at the embassy.
Bolsonaro flew to the U.S. in the final days of his term, in December 2022, just days before his supporters stormed the capital in a failed bid to oust President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva from power. He remained in South Florida for three months.
Some of Bolsonaro's political rivals seized on the news Monday to call for his arrest, alleging that he once again is signaling plans to escape.
“These images just reinforce that Bolsonaro is a confessed fugitive,” Alexandre Padilha, Lula's minister of institutional relations, told reporters in Brasilia, citing Bolsonaro's stint in the U.S. last year. “But what the courts and the Federal Police will do with these images (published by The New York Times) isn't for me to say.”
Augusto de Arruda Botelho, a criminal lawyer who has been an outspoken critic of the former president, wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that “Bolsonaro’s act of hiding in the embassy is a classic motive for decreeing preventive detention."
"It is one of those situations used as an example in books and classrooms,” he added.
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Brazil summons Hungarian envoy to explain why Bolsonaro hid in embassy
SAO PAULO (AP) — Brazil's Federal Police on Monday launched an investigation into former President Jair Bolsonaro's two-night stay last month at the Hungarian embassy in Brasilia, amid widespread speculation from his opponents that he may have been attempting to evade arrest.
A Federal Police source with knowledge of the investigation confirmed to The Associated Press that it was undertaken in response to a report from The New York Times, which featured security camera video of the Hungarian ambassador welcoming Bolsonaro on Feb. 12 and footage of Bolsonaro from the rest of his stay. Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, one of the leaders of a global far-right movement, is a key international ally of his.
The visit took place just days after Federal Police seized Bolsonaro’s Brazilian and Italian passports and raided the homes of his top aides as part of a probe into whether they plotted to ignore 2022 election results and stage an uprising to keep the defeated leader in power.
Bolsonaro has denied wrongdoing regarding this investigation, and multiple others targeting him.
Were the Federal Police to obtain an arrest warrant for the former president, officers would not have jurisdiction to enter the Hungarian embassy due to diplomatic conventions restricting access.
Bolsonaro’s lawyers said in a statement on Monday that there was nothing amiss about his embassy stay.
“In the days he was at the Hungarian embassy, by invitation, the former Brazilian president spoke to countless authorities from the friendly country for updates on the political scenarios of both nations,” his lawyers said in the statement. “Any other interpretations ... constitute an evidently fictional work, with no connection to the reality of the facts.”
Speaking at his party's headquarters in Sao Paulo, Bolsonaro told supporters he gets many calls from Orbán to discuss politics.
“To this day I have a relationship with some heads of state around the world,” Bolsonaro said. “If I had my passport, I would have traveled to Israel.”
Brazil's foreign ministry said in a short statement that it had summoned Hungary's ambassador Miklos Halmai to explain why Bolsonaro was his guest at the embassy.
Bolsonaro flew to the U.S. in the final days of his term, in December 2022, just days before his supporters stormed the capital in a failed bid to oust President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva from power. He remained in South Florida for three months.
Some of Bolsonaro's political rivals seized on the news Monday to call for his arrest, alleging that he once again is signaling plans to escape.
“These images just reinforce that Bolsonaro is a confessed fugitive,” Alexandre Padilha, Lula's minister of institutional relations, told reporters in Brasilia, citing Bolsonaro's stint in the U.S. last year. “But what the courts and the Federal Police will do with these images (published by The New York Times) isn't for me to say.”
Augusto de Arruda Botelho, a criminal lawyer who has been an outspoken critic of the former president, wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that “Bolsonaro’s act of hiding in the embassy is a classic motive for decreeing preventive detention."
"It is one of those situations used as an example in books and classrooms,” he added.
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Brazil summons Hungarian envoy to explain why Bolsonaro hid in embassy
Tom Phillips in Rio de Janeiro
Mon, March 25, 2024
Jair Bolsonaro hugs Hungary's prime minister, Viktor Orbán, right, in Budapest in 2022. ‘I won’t deny that I was in the embassy,’ he said on Monday.
Photograph: Attila Kisbenedek/AFP/Getty Images
Brazil’s foreign ministry has summoned the Hungarian ambassador to explain why the South American country’s embattled former president Jair Bolsonaro spent two nights “hiding” at Hungary’s embassy in Brasília last month as federal police investigators closed in on some of his closest allies.
Security footage obtained by the New York Times showed that in early February – four days after two Bolsonaro aides were arrested on suspicion of plotting to overthrow the Brazilian government – the rightwing populist took shelter in the embassy, a short drive from the presidential palace Bolsonaro once occupied.
The New York Times said Bolsonaro’s embassy stay suggested he was “seeking to leverage his friendship with a fellow far-right leader, Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán of Hungary, into an attempt to evade the Brazilian justice system as he faces criminal investigations at home”.
On Monday Bolsonaro confirmed the report, telling the Brazilian website Metrópoles: “I won’t deny that I was in the embassy … I won’t say where else I’ve been. I have a circle of friends with some heads of state around the world. They are worried. I talk to them about matters in our country’s interest. Full stop. The rest is speculation,” he was quoted as saying.
In a statement, the former president’s lawyers said he had been in the embassy “to keep in touch with the authorities of a friendly country”. Alternative interpretations amounted to “a work of fiction, with no connection to the reality of the facts” and were “fake news”, it added.
Related: Bolsonaro laid out plan for Brazil coup after defeat by Lula, ex-commanders say
Bolsonaro, who lost power in late 2022 after being beaten in the presidential election by his leftist rival Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, is facing a series of criminal investigations relating to claims that he faked Covid vaccination records, sought to siphon off expensive foreign gifts and, most seriously, that he plotted to topple the government of his successor.
On 8 February Bolsonaro was forced to surrender his passport as part of the federal police investigation into the alleged attempted coup on 8 January 2023 when Bolsonaro supporters ran riot in the capital. Two close aides, Marcelo Costa Câmara and Filipe Martins, were arrested and addresses linked to powerful former members of Bolsonaro’s administration searched.
That evening, Orbán tweeted a photograph in which he appeared shaking Bolsonaro’s hands and offered some words of support. “An honest patriot. Keep on fighting, Mr. President!”
Four days later, at 9.34pm on Monday 12 February, a black saloon car appeared at the gate of Hungary’s embassy in Brazil, according to the images obtained by the New York Times. Three minutes later the ambassador, Miklós Halmai, appeared to let his visitor in. Bolsonaro was taken inside.
The former president reportedly remained at the embassy until the afternoon of 14 February when the ambassador waved him off.
Bolsonaro did not make clear why he had decided to visit the embassy. However, he has publicly voiced fears of meeting the same fate as Bolivia’s former president, Jeanine Áñez. In 2022, Áñez was sentenced to 10 years in prison after being found guilty of helping orchestrate an alleged 2019 coup that brought her to power after the fall of President Evo Morales.
Before his election defeat, Bolsonaro said he saw only three possible futures for himself: prison, death or victory. The New York Times’s video suggests a fourth alternative may now be under consideration: a new life as a lodger in the Hungarian embassy, where under international law he cannot be arrested.
Reports of Bolsonaro’s two-day break at the embassy prompted calls for him to be detained to prevent him from escaping justice. “Bolsonaro’s attempt to hide himself in the embassy is a classic motive for preventive detention,” Augusto de Arruda Botelho, the former national secretary of justice, tweeted
Many social media users mocked the former president using the hashtag ‘Bolsonaro fujão’, which translates roughly as Bolsorunaway.
The Hungarian ambassador reportedly remained silent during his 20-minute meeting with Brazilian diplomats on Monday afternoon.
Brazil’s foreign ministry has summoned the Hungarian ambassador to explain why the South American country’s embattled former president Jair Bolsonaro spent two nights “hiding” at Hungary’s embassy in Brasília last month as federal police investigators closed in on some of his closest allies.
Security footage obtained by the New York Times showed that in early February – four days after two Bolsonaro aides were arrested on suspicion of plotting to overthrow the Brazilian government – the rightwing populist took shelter in the embassy, a short drive from the presidential palace Bolsonaro once occupied.
The New York Times said Bolsonaro’s embassy stay suggested he was “seeking to leverage his friendship with a fellow far-right leader, Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán of Hungary, into an attempt to evade the Brazilian justice system as he faces criminal investigations at home”.
On Monday Bolsonaro confirmed the report, telling the Brazilian website Metrópoles: “I won’t deny that I was in the embassy … I won’t say where else I’ve been. I have a circle of friends with some heads of state around the world. They are worried. I talk to them about matters in our country’s interest. Full stop. The rest is speculation,” he was quoted as saying.
In a statement, the former president’s lawyers said he had been in the embassy “to keep in touch with the authorities of a friendly country”. Alternative interpretations amounted to “a work of fiction, with no connection to the reality of the facts” and were “fake news”, it added.
Related: Bolsonaro laid out plan for Brazil coup after defeat by Lula, ex-commanders say
Bolsonaro, who lost power in late 2022 after being beaten in the presidential election by his leftist rival Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, is facing a series of criminal investigations relating to claims that he faked Covid vaccination records, sought to siphon off expensive foreign gifts and, most seriously, that he plotted to topple the government of his successor.
On 8 February Bolsonaro was forced to surrender his passport as part of the federal police investigation into the alleged attempted coup on 8 January 2023 when Bolsonaro supporters ran riot in the capital. Two close aides, Marcelo Costa Câmara and Filipe Martins, were arrested and addresses linked to powerful former members of Bolsonaro’s administration searched.
That evening, Orbán tweeted a photograph in which he appeared shaking Bolsonaro’s hands and offered some words of support. “An honest patriot. Keep on fighting, Mr. President!”
Four days later, at 9.34pm on Monday 12 February, a black saloon car appeared at the gate of Hungary’s embassy in Brazil, according to the images obtained by the New York Times. Three minutes later the ambassador, Miklós Halmai, appeared to let his visitor in. Bolsonaro was taken inside.
The former president reportedly remained at the embassy until the afternoon of 14 February when the ambassador waved him off.
Bolsonaro did not make clear why he had decided to visit the embassy. However, he has publicly voiced fears of meeting the same fate as Bolivia’s former president, Jeanine Áñez. In 2022, Áñez was sentenced to 10 years in prison after being found guilty of helping orchestrate an alleged 2019 coup that brought her to power after the fall of President Evo Morales.
Before his election defeat, Bolsonaro said he saw only three possible futures for himself: prison, death or victory. The New York Times’s video suggests a fourth alternative may now be under consideration: a new life as a lodger in the Hungarian embassy, where under international law he cannot be arrested.
Reports of Bolsonaro’s two-day break at the embassy prompted calls for him to be detained to prevent him from escaping justice. “Bolsonaro’s attempt to hide himself in the embassy is a classic motive for preventive detention,” Augusto de Arruda Botelho, the former national secretary of justice, tweeted
Many social media users mocked the former president using the hashtag ‘Bolsonaro fujão’, which translates roughly as Bolsorunaway.
The Hungarian ambassador reportedly remained silent during his 20-minute meeting with Brazilian diplomats on Monday afternoon.
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