Brazil election-denier 'terrorists' threaten president-elect Lula's inauguration, new minister says

RIO DE JANEIRO - Election-denying protesters camping outside Brazilian army bases have become “incubators of terrorism”, Brazil’s incoming justice minister said on Sunday, a day after police detonated an explosive device and arrested a suspect they accused of links to the Brasilia camp.

“Yesterday’s serious events in Brasilia prove that the so-called ‘patriotic’ camps have become incubators for terrorists,” tweeted Mr Flavio Dino, the incoming minister. “There will be no amnesty for terrorists, their supporters and financiers,” he added.

Supporters of President Jair Bolsonaro have been camped outside army bases in Brazil for weeks, urging the military to overturn the

victory of leftist President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva,

who takes office on Jan 1.

Mr Dino said arrangements for Mr Lula’s inauguration would be “re-evaluated, with a view to tightening security”.

Mr Robson Candido, head of the Civil Police in Brasilia, said a 54-year-old man from the north-eastern state of Para had been arrested and confessed to planting the device in a fuel truck near the Brasilia airport in order to sow chaos ahead of the inauguration.

The man, identified as George Washington de Oliveira Sousa, was arrested on Saturday on terrorism charges and is a supporter of Mr Bolsonaro, the far-right outgoing president.

The arrest came after the driver of the truck found the device on Saturday in the capital city.

Oliveira Sousa confessed to the authorities that the bomb was part of a plan to “start chaos” and “prevent the establishment of communism in Brazil”, according to statements by the civil police published in local media.

He said the idea was hatched with other Bolsonaro supporters who have been protesting outside the army base in Brasilia, calling for a military intervention to stop Mr Lula from assuming power.

The goal, Oliveira Sousa told police, was to place at least two explosives in strategic locations, with an aim of initiating a “declaration of a state of siege in the country” and from there “provoking an intervention by the armed forces”, Brazilian daily Folha de Sao Paulo reported.

“He came to participate in the protests, outside the army headquarters, and he’s part of that movement that supports the current president,” Mr Candido told reporters. “They’re in that mission, which according to them is ideological, but which has got out of control.”

Police also found assault-style rifles and other explosives at an apartment rented by the man in Brasilia. Mr Candido said the suspect was a registered gun-owner, part of the group CAC that has swelled sixfold to nearly 700,000 people since Mr Bolsonaro was elected in 2018 and began loosening gun laws.

Mr Candido said the man, and those helping him, had tried to activate the explosive device, but it had not gone off. He said it was still unclear how many other people were involved.

“We’ve never had bombs here in Brazil,” he said.

News of the bomb added another dimension to post-polls violence in Brazil, where tensions remain high after the most fraught election in a generation.

Mr Bolsonaro, who has yet to concede defeat, has been making baseless claims about the credibility of Brazil’s voting system, and many of his hardcore supporters believe him. The head of Brazil’s electoral court in November rejected a complaint from Mr Bolsonaro’s allies challenging the results of the presidential election.

The Brasilia camp protesters outside the army headquarters have become one of the country’s most extreme. On Dec 12, the day Mr Lula’s victory was certified, some of the camp dwellers attacked the federal police headquarters in Brasilia. REUTERS