Bolsonaro's lawyers call for acquittal in alleged coup trial
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Arab News
16 hours ago
- Arab News
Bolsonaro's lawyers call for acquittal in alleged coup trial
BRASILIA: Defense lawyers for former president Jair Bolsonaro asked Brazil's Supreme Court for an acquittal during Wednesday's closing arguments in a trial in which he is accused of attempting a lawyers argued in a 197-page document submitted to the court that the far-right former leader is 'innocent of all charges' and that an 'absolute lack' of evidence was presented during the trial, which began in and seven collaborators are accused of attempting to hold power despite his 2022 electoral defeat by Brazil's current leftist leader, Luiz Inacio Lula da of Bolsonaro supporters stormed government buildings in Brasilia on January 8, 2023, a week after Lula's inauguration, alleging election fraud and calling on the military to who led the Latin American country from 2019 to 2022, has maintained his innocence for months, calling any coup 'abhorrent.'He faces up to 40 years in prison if found was placed under house arrest in Brasilia this month for violating a ban on using social media to plead his case to the prosecutor's office maintains that Bolsonaro led an 'armed criminal organization' that orchestrated the coup attempt and was its main case file also focuses on meetings where draft decrees were allegedly presented, including those involving the possible imprisonment of officials such as Supreme Court the defense has stressed that 'there is no way to convict' Bolsonaro based on the evidence presented in the case file, which they argued adequately demonstrated that he ordered the transition of power to lawyers have questioned the validity of the plea bargain handed to Lt. Col. Mauro Cid, Bolsonaro's former aide, on whose testimony many of the accusations are legal wranglings are at the center of fizzing diplomatic tensions between Brazil and the United President Donald Trump has called the trial a 'witch hunt' and the US Treasury Department has sanctioned Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who is overseeing Bolsonaro's trial, in has also signed an executive order slapping 50 percent tariffs on many Brazilian imports, citing Bolsonaro's 'politically motivated persecution.'
Arab News
18 hours ago
- Arab News
Colombia buries assassinated presidential candidate
BOGOTA: Colombia buried murdered presidential candidate Miguel Uribe on Wednesday, with his widow tearfully warning that the country must shake its dark and long history of political violence. The 39-year-old conservative senator was shot in June while campaigning in the capital, Bogota, and died this week of his injuries. 'Our country is going through the darkest, saddest, and most painful days,' Maria Claudia Tarazona told a packed cathedral funeral service as she prepared to bury her husband. Police have blamed Uribe's murder on left-wing guerrillas who shunned 2016 peace accords. Six people have been arrested in connection with the alleged plot. For most Colombians, the assassination represented a shocking spasm of political violence after years of relative peace. Four presidential candidates were assassinated during the 1980s and 1990s, as drug cartels and various armed groups terrorized the country. Uribe's own mother, journalist Diana Turbay, was killed in a botched 1991 police operation to free her from cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar's Medellin cartel. On Wednesday Uribe's father, Miguel Uribe Londono, remembered the day 34 years ago when she was killed. 'With all the pain in my soul, I had to tell a little boy of barely four years old the horrendous news of his mother's murder,' he said at the service. 'In this same holy cathedral, I carried Miguel in one arm and the coffin of his mother, Diana, in the other.' 'Today, 34 years later, this senseless violence also takes from me that same little boy,' he said. As Colombia reels from the assassination, conservative lawmaker Julio Cesar Triana, a vocal critic of the government, escaped unharmed after his vehicle came under fire in the southern Huila region where dissident members of the defunct FARC guerrilla group are operating. Uribe's wife vowed at the funeral that his death at the hands of a suspected 15-year-old hitman would not be in vain, and that his young son and stepdaughters would live a life filled with love. 'Miguel, I will love you every day of my life until my time comes to meet you in heaven,' she said. 'I promise to give Alejandro and the girls a life full of love and happiness, without hatred and without resentment.' Colombia will hold elections in 2026 to replace incumbent leftist leader Gustavo Petro, who is constitutionally barred from running again. President Petro, himself a former guerrilla, said he chose not to attend Wednesday's funeral at the family's request. 'We're not going, not because we didn't want to,' he posted on social media. 'We simply respect the family and we avoid the funeral of Senator Miguel Uribe from being taken over by supporters of hate.' It was expected that some of those marking their respects may have booed the president, who has taken a conciliatory approach to armed groups. That stance has been strongly criticized by those on the right wing of Colombian politics. Former presidents Juan Manuel Santos, Ernesto Samper, and Cesar Gaviria attended the funeral.
Arab News
21 hours ago
- Arab News
US teen pilot claims innocence after charges dropped in Antarctica flight case
SANTIAGO, Chile: Ethan Guo, an American pilot and influencer who has been trapped in Antarctica for several weeks, maintained Wednesday that he is 'innocent' of the accusations against him, after being charged by Chilean authorities with submitting a false flight plan to reach the White Continent. Guo was charged on June 29 with handing false information to ground control and landing without authorization, but on Monday a judge dropped the charges as part of an agreement with his lawyers and Chile's prosecutors. It requires the teen to give a $30,000 donation to a children's cancer foundation within 30 days to avoid a trial. He must also leave the country as soon as conditions allow and is prohibited from reentering Chilean territory for three years. According to Guo's defense, the teen pilot was granted authorizations to deviate his initial route — from Punta Arenas, southern Chile, to Ushuaia, Argentina — and land at Teniente Marsh base in Chilean Antarctica due to 'weather and technical circumstances.' 'My client's actions are protected by a presumption of legality arising from the authorizations expressly granted by various DGAC ( Directorate General of Civil Aviation) officials,' his lawyer Jaime Barrientos said in documents handed to the court and shared with The Associated Press. According to Barrientos, evidence was presented that 'Mr. Guo informed the DGAC as soon as possible of the change to the filed flight plan, receiving express authorization to land at said aerodrome.' Guo, who turned 20 during his stay in Antarctica in July and has maintained his innocence, said in a statement sent to AP that during his original journey he 'encountered instrument failures and heavy, unreported icing conditions' which created 'an imminent risk of a crash.' 'Due to these cascading failures, Mr. Guo requested and received explicit, direct permission to land at the Marsh base from a high ranking DGAC official via WhatsApp, an authorization that was subsequently confirmed by the base's air traffic controller,' it said. The influencer added that the court's ruling last Monday was 'a direct result of the prosecutor's refusal to acknowledge this clear evidence.' The prosecutor's office has maintained in several interviews with local media that Guo has handed ' false information' to the respective authority and, by doing so, put at risk 'the safety of global air traffic.' 'What the background indicates is that he always had the will and the knowledge that he wanted to reach Antarctica at all costs, putting at risk not only his life, but also the safety of global air traffic,' prosecutor Cristián Crisosto told local Radio Bio Bio in an interview Wednesday. Guo made headlines last year when he began a trip in an attempt to become the youngest person to fly solo to all seven continents and at the same time collect donations for research into childhood cancer. But for the past six weeks, he has stayed at the Chilean Air Force base where he landed in June. He was not forced to stay there, only to remain in Chilean territory, but because of the severe winter in that part of the southern hemisphere, no flights were available. He has also been unable to fly his small plane, whose future remains uncertain. Crisosto said that the plane would probably have difficulty leaving Antarctica because it does not meet the necessary regulations. 'That plane could leave Antarctica in pieces. But I don't see it flying,' he warned.
