Buenos Aires, Jan 9, (dpa/GNA) – Security forces have cleared Brazil’s National Congress and other government sites in the capital Brasília, after hundred of supporters of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, stormed the area on Sunday.
Hundreds of protesters had earlier advanced onto the grounds of the parliament, tearing down road blocks and pushing past police officers, to reach the roof of the building.
They smashed the windows on the façade of the Congress building, and stormed through the entrance hall, as shown on Brazilian television channels.
After the attack on Congress, Bolsonaro supporters moved to the Supreme Court where they broke windows and entered the lobby. Later, they entered the Palácio do Planalto, the official workplace of the president, where they could be seen on television waving Brazilian flags, running through hallways and offices.
After several hours, security forces brought the buildings back under control, according to local media reports.
Demonstrators then gathered in parking lots and the lawn in front of the National Congress. The governor of Brasília, Ibaneis Rocha, said more than 400 people had been arrested.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was not in the capital at the time of the attack, strongly condemned the riots.
“All vandals will be found and punished,” Lula, who has only been office for a week, said. “We will also find out who financed them.”
Lula signed a federal intervention decree, allowing the government to assume responsibility for public security in Brasília, “in response to the terrorist acts,” the Ministry of Justice said.
“This absurd attempt to impose the will by force will not prevail,” Minister of Justice and Public Security Flávio Dino said in a statement.
Bolsonaro lost to Lula in the run-off election last October and left office at the turn of the year. He had never explicitly acknowledged his electoral defeat.
“Peaceful lawful demonstrations are part of democracy. However, depredations and invasions of public buildings as occurred today, as well as those practiced by the left in 2013 and 2017, escape the rule,” Bolsonaro tweeted on Sunday evening.
He said during his term as president, he had always respected and defended the law, democracy, transparency and freedom.
“In addition, I repudiate the accusations, without evidence, attributed to me by the current head of the executive of Brazil.”
Lula earlier in the day had accused his predecessor of making “several speeches… encouraging this.”
“This is also his responsibility and [of] the parties that supported him,” Lula added.
The leader of Bolsonaro’s Liberal Party condemned the riots.
“Today is a sad day for the Brazilian nation,” Valdemar Costa Neto said, in a video released Sunday.
“The events in Brasília today are a shame on us all, they don’t represent our party, they don’t represent Bolsonaro.”
“We support orderly demonstrations. Today’s actions are a disgrace.”
Senate President Rodrigo Pacheco condemned “these anti-democratic acts, which must be urgently punished with the severity of the law,” he wrote on Twitter.
As blame began to be traded over the failure of law enforcement to prevent the riots, Rocha said on Twitter that the head of security for the capital, Anderson Torres, has been sacked.
“I have decided to dismiss the security minister of the Federal District and, at the same time, I have sent all the security forces to the streets to arrest and punish those responsible,” Rocha wrote.
The head of Lula’s ruling Workers’ Party said Brasilia’s governor was in part to blame for the attack.
“The government of the Federal District was irresponsible in the face of the invasion of Brasília and the National Congress,” wrote Gleisi Hoffmann on Twitter.
“This was an announced crime against democracy, against the will of the voters and for other interests. The governor and his security minister, a supporter of Bolsonaro, are responsible for everything that is happening.”
US President Joe Biden said Brazil had Washington’s full support, he wrote on Twitter.
“I condemn the assault on democracy and on the peaceful transfer of power in Brazil. Brazil’s democratic institutions have our full support and the will of the Brazilian people must not be undermined.”
EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell, also condemned the “anti-democratic acts of violence” and reiterated the EU’s “full support” of Lula and to the Brazilian democratic system.
“Brazilian political leaders, and especially former President Bolsonaro, need to act responsibly and urge their supporters to go home. The place to resolve political differences is within Brazil’s democratic institutions and not through violence on the streets,” Borrell said in a statement.
Radical Bolsonaro supporters have already protested repeatedly against Lula’s victory after the election and called on the country’s armed forces to stage a military coup.
Contrary to custom, Bolsonaro did not attend the inauguration of his successor Lula on New Year’s Day, and flew to the US with his family.
GNA