Brazil’s Bolsonaro charged in alleged coup plot that included plan to poison Lula
The Supreme Court will decide whether to begin a criminal trial against the embattled former president
Brazil’s prosecutor-general on Tuesday formally charged former president Jair Bolsonaro with attempting a coup to stay in office after his 2022 election defeat, in a plot that included a plan to poison his successor and current President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and kill a Supreme Court judge.
Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet alleged that Bolsonaro and 33 others participated in a plan to remain in power. The alleged plot, he wrote, included a plan to poison Lula and shoot dead Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, a foe of the former president.
“The members of the criminal organisation structured a plan at the presidential palace to attack institutions, aiming to bring down the system of the powers and the democratic order, which received the sinister name of ‘Green and Yellow Dagger’,” Gonet wrote in a 272-page indictment. “The plan was conceived and taken to the knowledge of the president, and he agreed to it.”
Bolsonaro has often been seen in Brazil’s yellow-and-green national soccer jersey and the colours have become associated with his political movement.
Bolsonaro’s defence team said it met the accusations with “dismay and indignation”, adding in a statement that the former “president has never agreed to any movement aimed at deconstructing the democratic rule of law or the institutions that underpin it”.
Bolsonaro’s son, Flavio Bolsonaro, who is a senator, said on X that the indictment was “empty” and there was no evidence of wrongdoing. He accused the Prosecutor-General’s Office of serving “the nefarious interests of Lula”.