Category Archives: Jair Bolsonaro

Latin America’s lack of a united front on Covid has had disastrous consequences | Andre Pagliarini

Posted on by

The regional coordination of the pink tide era has given way to various governments, left and right, going it alone

A terse report filed from São Paulo, Brazil, appeared in the 17 March 1919 edition of the New York Times. It read: “Influenza again has appeared here in epidemic form. The Government is taking steps to prevent the spread of the disease.” Just over one hundred years later, faced with another pandemic, the Brazilian government has taken a different approach. President Jair Bolsonaro, the far-right extremist elected in 2018, has repeatedly downplayed the coronavirus, urging citizens to suck it up and get back to work so that the economy can once again get moving.

The president has frequently appeared in public places without a mask, stopping to greet supporters, creating potential super-spreader events as a matter of course. Bolsonaro’s recklessness has had terrible consequences: Latin America’s largest nation has been ravaged by the pandemic, with more than 13m cases.

Continue reading...

Brazil’s Covid-19 response is worst in the world, says Médecins Sans Frontières

Posted on by

The medical NGO says government negligence is costing lives as death toll exceeds 362,000, second only to US

The Brazilian government’s negligent response to Covid-19 has plunged the South American country into a snowballing “humanitarian catastrophe” that is likely to intensify in the coming weeks, the medical NGO Médecins Sans Frontières has warned.

“I have to be very clear in this: the Brazilian authorities’ negligence is costing lives,” the group’s international president, Christos Christou, told reporters on Thursday after Brazil’s official death toll rose to more than 362,000, second only to the US.

Continue reading...

Bolsonaro’s ‘genocidal’ Covid response has led to Brazilian catastrophe, Dilma Rousseff says

Posted on by

Former president tells Guardian Brazil faces perhaps gravest moment in its history and is ‘adrift on an ocean of hunger and disease’

Jair Bolsonaro’s perverse and “genocidal” response to one of the world’s deadliest Covid outbreaks has left Brazil “adrift on an ocean of hunger and disease”, the country’s former president Dilma Rousseff has claimed.

Speaking to the Guardian this week – as Brazil’s coronavirus death toll hit devastating new heights, with more than 12,000 deaths in the last three days – Rousseff said her country faced perhaps the gravest moment in its history.

Continue reading...

Brazil’s coronavirus death toll passes 4,000 a day for first time

Posted on by

Covid crisis ‘out of control’, says expert as president Jair Bolsonaro continues to resist lockdown

Brazil’s coronavirus catastrophe has deepened further after more than 4,000 daily deaths were reported for the first time since the outbreak began in February last year.

At least 4,195 people were reported to have lost their lives on Tuesday, taking Brazil’s total death toll – the world’s second highest after the US – to nearly 337,000.

Continue reading...

Amid Brazil’s tragedy, our hope is the prospect of Bolsonaro’s defeat next year | Celso Amorim

Posted on by

As Covid deaths climb the president seems to be throwing the country into an abyss that will be difficult to escape from

It is no exaggeration to say that Brazil is going through the most serious crisis in its history. With nearly 4,000 deaths a day and moving quickly towards a figure of 500,000 people killed by Covid-19, Brazil is not just the epicentre of the pandemic. It has also become the breeding ground for new variants of the virus: a real threat to its own people and the whole of humankind.

In the midst of a public health war that is being lost, its president, Jair Bolsonaro, is throwing the country more deeply into an abyss, from where it will be hard to emerge. Apart from the suffering caused to hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of relatives and friends of the victims, the economy has been plunged into recession, with 14% of the workforce condemned to the dole. In contrast to what happened during the first wave of the pandemic, when Congress forced the government to distribute relatively significant financial aid to a large portion of the population, now fewer people will benefit with a smaller amount.

Continue reading...

Brazil: calls grow for removal of ‘coup-mongering’ Bolsonaro as crisis builds

Posted on by

Opposition leaders demand impeachment for what they say is president’s illegal attempt to co-opt the country’s armed forces

Prominent leaders of Brazil’s opposition have called for president Jair Bolsonaro to be immediately removed from office to prevent his “coup-mongering, authoritarian delusions” becoming a reality.

“We cannot be bystanders to this barbarism,” congressman Marcelo Freixo said on Wednesday as parliamentarians demanded Bolsonaro’s impeachment for what they called his illegal attempt to co-opt the armed forces.

Continue reading...

What’s next for Brazil as Jair Bolsonaro’s troubles deepen?

Posted on by

The president has stacked his government with military men. Now that blurring of institutional lines may backfire

It is not surprising that the government of Jair Bolsonaro is in crisis. Setting aside his ruinous response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the radically reactionary leader of the largest country in Latin America has never displayed the ability or desire to use political means to benefit anyone but those closest to him. Still, the scale and rapidity of the upheaval this week has raised concerns that Brazilians may soon confront a full-blown political meltdown on top of the public health disaster that has been unfolding for several months.

On Monday, Ernesto Araújo, the foreign minister, resigned. His tenure had been marked by brash self-righteous rhetoric delivered without a glimmer of grace or confidence. Indeed, Araújo became known for masking his palpable insecurity with long, confusing references to Latin and Greek antiquity. Aráujo embraced conspiracy theories and far-right ideas that endeared him to the constellation of far-right governments that emerged around the world in recent years, particularly the Trump administration in Washington, but failed to deliver many tangible results for the Brazilian people (this is why two years ago I called Araújo “the worst diplomat in the world”).

Continue reading...

Brazil on edge as three military chiefs resign after Bolsonaro fires defense minister

Posted on by

Political earthquake rattles country already grappling with one of the world’s worst coronavirus outbreaks

Jair Bolsonaro’s crisis-stricken administration has been rocked by the sudden sacking of Brazil’s defence minister and the subsequent resignation of the heads of all three branches of the armed forces.

The commanders of the Brazilian army, navy and air force – Gen Edson Leal Pujol, Adm Ilques Barbosa and Lt-Brig Antônio Carlos Bermudez – met with the president’s new minister on Tuesday morning and reportedly tendered their resignations during a dramatic and heated encounter. On Tuesday afternoon the defence ministry confirmed all three would be replaced, a political earthquake that rattled a country already grappling with one of the world’s worst coronavirus outbreaks.

Continue reading...

‘The heart of darkness’: neighbors shun Brazil over Covid response

Posted on by

Latin American countries scramble to protect themselves from a country where nearly 60,000 people are expected to die in March alone

It has long been regarded as a soft power superpower, the sun-kissed, culturally blessed land of Bossa Nova, Capoeira and Pelé.

But Brazil’s shambolic response to coronavirus under far-right president Jair Bolsonaro has cast Latin America’s largest country in an unfamiliar and unpleasant role: that of a Covid-riddled, science-shunning, politically-unstable outcast on whom many regional neighbors are now shutting the door.

Continue reading...

Brazil’s foreign minister, who bashed China and praised Trump, resigns

Posted on by

Ernesto Araújo’s resignation ends the most calamitous chapter in the history of the country’s diplomacy, critics say

Jair Bolsonaro’s ultraconservative foreign minister has resigned after a rebellion from diplomats and lawmakers who accused him of demolishing Brazil’s international reputation and putting Brazilian lives at risk by vandalizing relations with China and the US during the coronavirus pandemic.

Ernesto Araújo, a 53-year-old career diplomat famed for his bashing of Xi Jinping’s China and devotion to Donald Trump, tendered his resignation on Monday, ending what critics call the most calamitous chapter in the history of Brazilian diplomacy.

Continue reading...

‘The Yanomami could disappear’ – photographer Claudia Andujar on a people under threat in Brazil

Posted on by

Andujar lived with the tribe and fights for them. A timely show of her images comes to London soon


It is more than 50 years since Claudia Andujar began photographing the Yanomami, the people of the Amazon rainforest near Brazil’s border with Venezuela. Now 89, she is using her archive to increase their visibility, at a time when their survival is under renewed threat.

“The question of indigenous people should be more respected, more widely known. This is very important as it’s the only way the present [Brazilian] government will come to recognise their rights as human beings to occupy their land,” says Andujar, speaking from São Paulo. “This government isn’t interested in their rights.”

Continue reading...

‘Saddest March of our lives’: Brazilians lament Covid devastation as critics decry Bolsonaro

Posted on by

As country reaches 300,000 fatalities, doctors condemn ‘politics of death’ but pledge to fight on

Like so many on Brazil’s left, Pedro Carvalho was certain Jair Bolsonaro’s presidency would prove a nightmare: for human rights, for the environment and for the national health system the 41-year-old doctor cherishes and serves.

“I felt this profound sadness, just utter, personal sadness,” Carvalho remembered of the fateful moment in October 2018 that the far-right populist was confirmed as his country’s new leader.

Continue reading...

Brazil set to lose its third health minister amid pandemic as Covid death toll rises

Posted on by

Eduardo Pazuello expected to depart after 10 months as coronavirus fatalities near 280,000

The Brazilian health minister, Eduardo Pazuello, is set to be sacked after an inglorious 10-month tenure during which more than 260,000 Brazilians have been killed by a coronavirus outbreak that his government stands accused of catastrophically mismanaging.

Related: 'Covid is taking over': Brazil plunges into deadliest chapter of its epidemic

Continue reading...

‘Covid is taking over’: Brazil plunges into deadliest chapter of its epidemic

Posted on by

Last year, Jair Bolsonaro declared Brazil had reached ‘the tail end’ of one of the world’s worst outbreaks. Three months later the country has lost almost 100,000 more lives

It was midway through February when André Machado realized Brazil’s coronavirus catastrophe was racing into a bewildering and remorseless new phase. “The floodgates opened and the water came gushing out,” recalled the infectious disease specialist from the Our Lady of the Conception hospital in Porto Alegre, one of the largest cities in southern Brazil.

Related: Experts warn Brazil facing darkest days of Covid crisis as deaths hit highest level

Continue reading...

Lula excoriates Bolsonaro’s ‘moronic’ Covid response in comeback speech

Posted on by

Addressing the nation, Brazil’s former president left no doubt that his political fightback had begun

Brazil’s former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has excoriated Jair Bolsonaro’s “moronic” and bungling response to the coronavirus pandemic, in a stirring and potentially historic address widely seen as the start of a bid to wrestle the presidency back from his far-right nemesis.

The veteran leftist, who led Latin America’s top economy through some of the brightest years in its modern history, was catapulted back onto the frontline of Brazilian politics on Monday by the surprise decision to quash the corruption convictions that scuppered his bid to reclaim the presidency in 2018. On Tuesday a supreme court judge branded the anti-corruption operation that forced Lula from that year’s election “the greatest judicial scandal” in Brazilian history.

Continue reading...

Jair Bolsonaro tells Brazilians to stop ‘whining’ about Covid – video

Posted on by

The Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, told citizens to stop ‘whining’ about Covid, despite the virus having killed more than 260,000 people in the country.

The far-right populist made the inflammatory declaration on Thursday, as Brazil’s already dire Covid situation deteriorated and its average daily death toll rose above that of the United States.

‘Enough fussing and whining. How much longer will the crying go on?’ Bolsonaro asked supporters in the midwestern state of Goiás, where nearly 9,000 people have died.

Continue reading...

Covid: Bolsonaro tells Brazilians to stop ‘whining’ as deaths top 260,000

Posted on by
  • Far-right president: ‘How long are you going to keep on crying?’
  • Critics condemn Bolsonaro as ‘incurable sociopath’

The Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, has triggered a wave of revulsion by telling citizens to stop “whining” about a coronavirus outbreak that has killed more than 260,000 people.

The far-right populist made the inflammatory declaration on Thursday, as Brazil’s already dire Covid situation deteriorated and its average daily death toll rose above that of the United States.

Continue reading...

Rio mayor imposes Covid curfew to avert repeat of last year’s ‘genocide’

Posted on by
  • Scientists call for immediate 14-day lockdown
  • Brazil suffers record 1,840 daily fatalities

The mayor of Rio de Janeiro has ordered a coronavirus “curfew” in the hope of sparing the seaside city a repeat of last year’s Covid-19 “genocide” when it was pummeled by the disease.

The nighttime prohibition, which Mayor Eduardo Paes said would last from 11pm to 5am, was announced as hospitals across Brazil buckled under the strain of a crippling upsurge in infections and the South American country suffered its worst day of losses since the pandemic began.

Continue reading...

Experts warn Brazil facing darkest days of Covid crisis as deaths hit highest level

Posted on by

Intensive care units in 17 of the country’s 26 states were near capacity, while six states and the capital had run out of ICU beds

Health experts and lawmakers have warned Brazil is steaming into the darkest days of its coronavirus catastrophe, as fatalities soared to new heights and one prominent politician compared the crisis to an atomic bomb.

Politicians from across the spectrum voiced anger and exasperation at the deteriorating situation on Monday, after Brazil’s weekly average of Covid deaths hit its highest level since the epidemic began last February and hospitals around the country reported being swamped.

Continue reading...

Anger as Bolsonaro moves to make guns easier to access: ‘A threat to democracy’

Posted on by

Gun control campaigners appalled after Brazil’s pro-gun president announces four decrees to facilitate acquiring weapons

Jair Bolsonaro’s latest efforts to make guns more easily available to Brazilians have sparked anger and trepidation with some calling the moves a threat to the South American country’s young democracy.

Brazil’s pro-gun president announced four presidential decrees designed to facilitate legal access to weapons on Saturday morning, as the country’s coronavirus death toll swelled to nearly 240,000.

Continue reading...