General Dutra denies the Army’s omission in the camp withdrawal from the HQ front

General Gustavo Henrique Dutra de Menezes denied this Thursday (14) any type of omission by the military in the demobilization of the camp set up in front of the Army headquarters (HQ), in Brasília. He gave a statement to CPMI on January 8th. At the time, the general was the commander of the Planalto Military Command, therefore, responsible for the barracks.

“My decision to resolve this issue included the indirect strategy for the demobilization of the camp, which implied the prevalence of actions that avoided any direct confrontation with the protesters… This strategy proved to be appropriate,” he said.

Dutra is one of those investigated by the Military Public Ministry in the investigation that investigates negligence or omission in the January 8th invasions, reported the Brazil Agency. The soldier recalled the almost 70 days the camp lasted. According to him, at the height of the demonstrations, the place received 100 thousand people, on November 15, 2022.

He added that the evacuation of people was done gradually. In the general’s assessment, the camp was a peaceful demonstration, and there was no reason for the Army to declare it illegal. According to Dutra, the profile of the campers changed from the 6th to the 7th, the day before the acts of vandalism.

“The camp was empty. The people who were on the 6th were people in a very vulnerable situation, they were homeless people. People who had come from another state and didn’t have money to return to their states. That was the situation at the camp on the 6th. On the 7th, there was a very large flow of buses to Brasília. These people arrived on the 7th. The people who were on the 7th were not the people who were in the camp during November and December”, he stated.

During the hearing, senator Jorge Seif (PL-SC) cried when he called the general a “coward”. Seif showed a video in which people who were in front of the HQ asked the Armed Forces to “save Brazil”.

“You are a coward. And you salute a communist. And today you serve a thief. And you betrayed your people, you had all the conditions to demobilize the camps and you didn’t do anything to leave Flávio Dino afterwards. You don’t they demobilized, but after it became a government, to flatter this government of thieves, of bastards who ruined our country and will ruin it again. You send ladies, gentlemen, families and children, to be arrested, so that now they can be pitied, general? Coward “, said the senator crying.