Chile summoned the Brazilian ambassador to Santiago on Monday in protest at the statements of President Jair Bolsonaro against his Chilean counterpartGabriel Boric, whom he accused of “setting fire to the Metro” in the 2019 protests, Foreign Minister Antonia Urrejola reported.
(Read here: Elections in Brazil: this was the first debate between Lula and Bolsonaro)
“It seems to us that these statements are very serious. Obviously they are absolutely false and we regret that in an electoral context bilateral relations are taken advantage of and polarized through disinformation and false news,” Urrejola said.
(See also: Constitutional reform in Chile: ‘the rejection proposal will win’)
The reaction responded to Bolsonaro’s words during the tense electoral debate he held on Sunday night with former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.who leads the polls prior to the October elections.
In his statement, the Brazilian president accused leftist President Boric of having been behind the burning of several Santiago Metro stations during the protests that broke out on October 18, 2019, demanding greater social equality.
Lula “supported the president of Chile as well, the same one who practiced acts of setting fire to the Metro, and look where Chile is going,” Bolsonaro said in the debate, after listing his rival’s support for various leftist governments in Latin America. .
“We have summoned the Brazilian ambassador for this afternoon at the Foreign Ministry on behalf of the general secretary of foreign policy, where we will send him a note of protest,” explained Urrejola.
‘Corrupt government’
After a week of student protests, on October 18, 2019, several Santiago metro stations were vandalized by protesters and dozens ended up completely or partially burned.
Since that day, massive street demonstrations have been unleashed, some of them very violent, to demand social improvements. A month later, the political forces reached an agreement to call a plebiscite to decide whether or not to end the Constitution bequeathed by the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990).
By 78%, the option of changing the Constitution was imposed, which was followed by the election of a constitutional convention that in one year drafted a new Magna Carta, which will be put to the vote in a referendum this Sunday.
In addition to the attacks on Boric and other leftist leaders in the region, Bolsonaro launched harsh accusations against Lula. “His government was the most corrupt in the history of Brazil,” launched the far-right, 67, in his first speech addressed to the leader of the left, favorite in the polls.
Minutes before the debate, he had branded him a “thief.” Lula, 76, retorted defending the social advances of his administration (2003-2010) and saying that the current president “is destroying” the country.
AFP
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