Brazil: Lula sacks Army Chief Arruda for shielding suspects during protests

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Brazil's new president, has dismissed the chief of the army following allegations that the General attempted to protect right-wing protesters from arrest following the Brasilia uprising on January 8.General Julio Cesar de Arruda, who had assumed office in late December only, was fired on Saturday, nearly two weeks after Bolsonaro supporters wreaked havoc in the Brazilian capital. Lula's government referred to the invasion as a failed coup attempt.

Arruda reportedly prevented police from capturing suspected rioters who sought safety at an encampment outside Brasilia's army headquarters on the night of the incident. Some of Lula's friends believe Arruda is politically connected with Bolsonaro.

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"You are not going to arrest people here," Arruda told Lula's justice minister, Flávio Dino, Washington Post reported.

"Many people in the military police were complicit. There were many people in the armed forces here inside [the palace] who were complicit," the leftist political veteran said four days after the attack.

"This chap has managed to pollute the entire armed forces," Lula added of Bolsonaro, who escaped to the US on the eveof the January 1 inauguration and refused to accept defeat in last October's polls.

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According to the Brazilian newspaper O Globo, Lula has fired at least 80 military personnel from their positions in the last five days in an apparent effort to purge ardent Bolsonaro supporters.

General Tomás Miguel Ribeiro Paiva, the 62-year-old commander of the military command in charge of the southeast in So Paulo, will take over from Arruda.

Ribeiro Paiva hasasked troops to accept the outcome of the election from last October, which Lula won by roughly two million votes, in a speech shared on social media on Friday.

"It doesn’t matter [what the result of an election is], it must be respected. It might not always be what we want, but that doesn’t matter," Ribeiro Paiva asserted, regardless of whatever their commander-in-chief was, the military will carry out its task.

(With inputs from agencies)

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