The Brazilian Foreign Ministry called this Monday Hungarian ambassador, Miklós Halmai, to explain the stay of former president Jair Bolsonaro in the embassy from that country after he had surrendered his passport to the Federal Police in February.
According to The New York Times, Bolsonaro took refuge between February 12 and 14 in the Hungarian Embassy in Brasilia, four days after the Federal Police launched an operation against him and his closest circle for attempting a coup against the Government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
After the operation, the Supreme Court detained several people trusted by the former president, on whom it also imposed a series of precautionary measures, including the passport confiscation to prevent you from leaving the country and they prohibited him from maintaining contact with other investigators.
The images revealed by the newspaper They show that the former president was at the embassy for two days with two members of his security and was treated by diplomatic personnel and the European country's own ambassador.
The New York Times reviewed three days of recordings and compared them with satellite images, which determined that the former president was confined under diplomatic protection until the afternoon of February 14.
Embassy staff also confirmed to the newspaper, on condition of anonymity, that the former president, who faces accusations of embezzlement, falsification of covid-19 vaccination certificates and an attempted coup in 2022, He was at the embassy for two days.
Bolsonaro has a good relationship with the Prime Minister of Hungary, the ultra-conservative Víktor Orban, so His stay at the embassy was seen by experts as a kind of 'refuge' in case the authorities tried to arrest him.
The events can also be interpreted as interference by the Hungarian government in Brazil's internal affairs.
According to sources from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Hungarian ambassador was received this Monday by the Secretary for Europe and North America, ambassador Maria Luísa Escorel, but they did not give details of the meeting.
After the news came to light, Bolsonaro's lawyers stated that the former Brazilian president He spent “two days staying” at the Hungarian Embassy in Brasilia, as a guest and to talk about politics with authorities in that country, and they stressed that any other interpretation, such as asking for asylum, is “fiction.”
“Any other interpretation that goes beyond the information provided here constitutes an obvious work of fiction, unrelated to the reality of the facts and is, in practice, yet another fake news,” the lawyers stated.
Any other interpretation that goes beyond the information provided here constitutes an obvious work of fiction.
The defense of Bolsonaro, a retired Army captain, maintains that he spent two days “lodging” to “maintain contacts with the authorities” of a country that he described as a “friend.”
“As it is well known, The former president maintains a good relationship with the Hungarian Prime Minister (Viktor Orbán), with whom he recently met at the inauguration of (Argentine) President Javier Milei in Buenos Aires,” he stated in a note.
Likewise, he stressed that Bolsonaro was “invited” and that during his stay he “spoke with numerous authorities of the friendly country” to “get updated” on “the political scenarios of the two nations.”
Bolsonaro only appears as being investigated in the coup case, although his judicial future has been complicated after the revealing testimonies to the Police of Marco Antonio Freire Gomes and Carlos Baptista Júnior, former commanders of the Army and Aeronautics.
Both declared that they met several times with Bolsonaro and his closest advisors, and that they invited them to support their plan to carry out a coup, which included intervening in the Superior Electoral Court, decreeing a state of siege and even arresting judges, as well as the head of Congress.
EFE
#Bolsonaro39s #stay #Hungarian #embassy #spark #controversy #Brazil