Former Attorney General Anderson Torres
Brazilian judicial authorities have ordered the arrest of senior government officials after rioters stormed key government offices in Brasilia.
One of the officials, the former military police commander, was arrested, local media reported.
Also among those responsible, the prosecutor’s office said, were former Brasilia public safety chief Anderson Torres and others “responsible for the acts and omissions” that led to the riots.
Torres denies any role in the riots.
Colonel Fabio Augusto, the police chief, has been sacked after supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro stormed Congress, the presidential palace and the Supreme Court.
The riots came a week after President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, widely known as Lula, was sworn in.
In dramatic scenes, thousands of protesters, some wearing Brazilian yellow T-shirts and waving flags, managed to outflank the police and pillage the heart of the Brazilian state.
Of the roughly 1,500 people arrested and taken to the police academy after the riot, officials say, nearly 600 have been transferred to other facilities, where police officials have five days to formally charge them.
On Tuesday, a federal public safety official accused Torres of being responsible for “organized sabotage.”
Ricardo Capelli, who has been assigned to the security department in Brasilia, said there was a “lack of leadership” from Torres before the storming of government buildings.
Lula’s inauguration on Jan. 1 was “a very successful security operation,” Capelli told CNN.
What changed earlier Sunday was that on January 2, “Anderson Torres took over as security minister, fired the entire leadership and walked out,” he said.
“If this isn’t sabotage, I don’t know what is,” added Capelli.
Torres said he deeply regrets the “absurd assumption” that he played a role in the riots.
She said the scenes, which occurred during her family vacation, were unfortunate and that it was the “bitterest day” of her personal and professional life.
Lula accused the security forces of “neglecting” their duty not to stop “terrorist acts” in Brasilia.
On Tuesday, prosecutors asked a federal audit court to freeze Bolsonaro’s assets in light of the recent riots.
The former president, who condemned the unrest, did not admit defeat in the October election that divided the country, and traveled to the United States before handing over his post on January 1. He was taken to a hospital in Florida on Monday with abdominal pains.
On Tuesday, Bolsonaro said he would return to Brazil, telling CNN he would bring forward his departure from the United States, originally scheduled for late January.
After a day of rioting, heavily armed officers began dismantling a camp of Bolsonaro supporters in Brasilia, one of several camps set up outside army barracks across the country since the presidential election.
Torres, who had previously served as justice minister in Bolsonaro’s government, was fired from his post as public security minister on Sunday by Brasilia governor Ibañes Rocha.
Rocha himself was later removed from office for 90 days by the Supreme Court.
Lula also targeted the security forces, accusing them of “incompetence, bad faith or malice” for failing to prevent protesters from reaching parliament.
He said, “You’ll see in the pictures that they are [ضباط الشرطة] They direct people to walk to Praca dos Tres Powers”. “We will find out who are the financiers of these vandals who went to Brasilia and they will all pay the price by force of law,” she added.
A video clip published by the Brazilian newspaper “O Globo” showed some agents laughing and taking pictures together, while in the background protesters occupied the parliament campus.
Protesters have gathered since Sunday morning on the lawns in front of the parliament and along the kilometre-long Esplanada avenue, lined with government ministries and national monuments.
Despite the actions of protesters, in the hours leading up to the chaos, security appeared tight, with roads closed around the parliament area and armed police guarding every entrance to the area.
The BBC saw around 50 police officers Sunday morning local time. Cars were denied entry, while police searched the bags of those entering on foot.
According to BBC South America’s Katie Watson, some of the protesters are not only angry that Bolsonaro lost the election, but want President Lula back in jail.
He said Bolsonaro has remained silent since he lost the October election, adding that by not publicly acknowledging defeat he has allowed his ardent supporters to remain angry about the democratic election he legitimately lost.
The former president condemned the attack and denied his responsibility for encouraging rioters in a tweet about six hours after the violence erupted.
On Tuesday, his son, Brazilian Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, said people shouldn’t try to link his father to the riots, noting that he had been quietly “licking his wounds” since he lost the election.
