G20 guards arrested over alleged 2022 Lula assassination plot

Brazilian police on Tuesday arrested four soldiers guarding the G20 summit over an alleged plot to assassinate then President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in a 2022 “coup,” a federal police source told AFP.

The four “were arrested in Rio, where they were participating in the security operation for the G20 leaders’ meeting,” said the source, who added that a police officer was also taken into custody.

A statement by Brazil’s federal police said the suspects were “mostly soldiers with special forces training,” but made no mention of them being part of the current G20 summit security deployment.

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They were arrested Tuesday in an operation to “dismantle a criminal organisation responsible for planning a coup d’etat to prevent the government legitimately elected in 2022 elections taking office,” it said.