Attack in Brazil not considered an isolated event

Justice Alexandre de Moraes, of the Supreme Federal Court (STF) of Brazil, said today that the attack perpetrated last night against the capital headquarters of the court by a suicide bomber is not an isolated event.    

The magistrate defended the punishment of criminals who attack democracy, such as the acts of January 8, 2023, and argued that eventual impunity will generate even more aggression.

According to De Moraes, the country needs pacification, but it will only be possible with the punishment of coup plotters. He also assessed that the episode may be the most serious attack on the Supreme Court.

Last night a car exploded in annex four of the Chamber of Deputies. Seconds later, a man threw an explosive in front of the STF. Such a detonator was attached to his body, which caused his death. According to police reports, the aggressor is Francisco Wanderley Luiz, 59 years old and a candidate for councilor in Rio del Sur, a municipality in the southern state of Santa Catarina, for the Liberal Party of former President Jair Bolsonaro, in 2020.

“What happened yesterday is not an isolated event. God willing it is an isolated act, but in the context, it is part of a plot that began back there,” said the magistrate.

In this sense, he cited the so-called hate office as the initiator of speeches against institutions, the Supreme Court, the autonomy of the Judiciary, ministers and their families.

He warned that this process was raised on the false cloak of a criminal use of freedom of expression. “Nowhere in the world is that freedom of expression. That is a crime,” he stressed.

For De Moraes, the result of the attempt to discredit the institutions was on January 8, 2023, when radical supporters of Bolsonaro invaded and ransacked the National Congress, the STF and the Presidential Palace, under cries of military intervention.

“And the pacification of the country is necessary, but it is only possible with the responsibility of all criminals. There is no pacification with amnesty for criminals. We know that the sanctioned criminal is an unpunished criminal. And impunity will generate more aggression, as it did yesterday,” he reiterated.

De Moraes took on the report of the investigation into the explosions in the capital’s Plaza de los Tres Poderes. The personal security of the STF ministers was reinforced.

The attack occurred days before Brazil hosted the G20 leaders’ summit in the city of Rio de Janeiro (November 18 and 19) and a state visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping to this capital.