International
Lula asks for severe sanction if the guilt of general arrested for coup is proven
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said on Sunday that reserve general Walter Braga Netto, accused of leading an attempted coup d’état in 2022, has the right to the presumption of innocence, but must be severely punished if his guilt is proven.
The head of state referred to the arrest of Braga Netto in a brief comment that he slipped during the interview he gave after being discharged from the hospital where he was admitted on Monday and in which he underwent surgery to treat an intracranial hemorrhage.
“About what happened this week with the arrest warrant issued against General Braga Netto… I’m going to show you that I have more patience and that I’m democratic. I think he has every right to the presumption of innocence. I didn’t have it, but I want them to have it,” he said in reference to his imprisonment for two corruption processes that ended up annulled.
But, he added, “if those people did what they tried to do, they have to be severely punished.”
The arrest of Braga Netto
The former Minister of Defense and the Presidency in the Government of the far-right leader Jair Bolsonaro was arrested this Saturday at his residence in Rio de Janeiro by order of the Supreme Court after the Federal Police accused him of obstructing the investigation of the coup plot.
The Army reserve general, who was a candidate for vice president as Bolsonaro’s running mate in the 2022 elections, is accused of being the main articulator of an attempted coup d’état to prevent Lula’s investiture and an alleged plan to assassinate the progressive leader.
“It is not possible for us to admit that, in a generous country like Brazil, there are people of high military grade plotting the death of the President of the Republic, plotting the death of his vice president and plotting the death of a judge who was president of the Supreme Electoral Court,” Lula said in reference to the accusations against Braga Netto.
The defendants
Both the detained general and Bolsonaro are among the 37 defendants to whom the Federal Police requested that charges be opened for having planned a coup to prevent Lula’s investiture in January 2023.
Despite these accusations, Braga Netto arrested him preventively because, according to the Federal Police, he had been making steps to hinder the investigation and prevent the collection of evidence.
Magistrate Alexandre de Moraes, a member of the Supreme Court responsible for the case and for the arrest warrant, said in his sentence that the investigations “revealed the very serious participation of Walter Braga Neto in the facts investigated and his true role as leader, organizer and financier.”
The reserve general was taken to the headquarters of the First Army Division on the same Saturday, in the so-called ‘Military Villa’ in Rio de Janeiro, where he was placed in the custody of the Armed Forces for having the right to remain in a special cell in a military barracks.
International
TikTok sale advances as Trump reveals deal is in place
U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed on Sunday that TikTok has secured a buyer, marking a key step for the popular video-sharing platform to continue operating in the United States.
“We have a buyer for TikTok. We’ll probably need China’s approval,” said the Republican leader during an interview with Sunday Morning Futures on Fox News. Without naming the company, Trump said it is a “very wealthy” tech firm, and the identity will likely be revealed within “two weeks.”
Under former President Joe Biden, Congress passed legislation requiring TikTok’s parent company, the Chinese firm ByteDance, to divest the app to a buyer from a “non-adversarial” country by January 20, the day Trump returned to the White House following his reelection.
Due to the lack of an agreement, TikTok temporarily ceased operations in the U.S. until Trump, on his first day back in office, signed an executive order granting a 75-day extension. He later issued another 75-day extension on April 4, and most recently extended the deadline an additional 90 days, until September 17.
Trump, who has publicly stated he has “a soft spot for TikTok,” believes the platform played a vital role in building his popularity among younger voters during the last election.
International
Protests erupt over Florida’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ migrant jail in the Everglades
Hundreds of environmentalists, Indigenous leaders, and activists gathered on Saturday to protest against the planned opening of a migrant detention center dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” which, according to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, could begin operating as early as Tuesday and hold up to 3,000 migrants.
The protest took place amid active construction at the site, located in the Everglades Natural Park—an ecologically sensitive wetlands region west of Miami. Demonstrators raised concerns about the environmental impact on an area that is home to 36 native species of plants and animals that are threatened or endangered.
Protest signs read messages such as: “This scam will cost us $450 million and destroy our precious Everglades,”“Continuing with ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ is criminal,” and “These are concentration camps on Indigenous land.”
The backlash intensified after a televised segment aired the night before on Fox and Friends, where DeSantis toured the facility—built on an abandoned airport—and suggested the detention center could start receiving migrants as early as Tuesday.
Internacionales
Jalisco’s grim discovery: drug cartel mass grave found in construction site
A mass grave was discovered in a residential area under construction in the municipality of Zapopan, part of the metropolitan area of Guadalajara, the capital of the Mexican state of Jalisco.
“After analyzing the recovered remains, they correspond to 34 individuals,” said a state official during a press conference. Jalisco has one of the highest numbers of missing persons in Mexico, largely due to the activity of drug cartels.
As of May 31, official data shows that Jalisco has recorded 15,683 missing persons, according to the state prosecutor’s office. Authorities attribute most of these cases to criminal organizations, which often bury or cremate their victims clandestinely.
“The construction company notified us at the end of February after discovering some remains,” explained the official, González, adding that excavation efforts have been ongoing since then.
The Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) operates in the region and was designated as a foreign terrorist organization earlier this year by the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. Washington has accused CJNG and the Sinaloa cartel of being the main sources of fentanyl trafficking, a synthetic opioid responsible for tens of thousands of overdose deaths in the U.S.
Mexico has accumulated more than 127,000 missing persons, most of them since 2006, when the federal government launched a heavily criticized military-led anti-drug offensive.
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