Authorities in Argentina on Tuesday denied local media reports that Brazilian Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, who lost Sunday's run-off election in the neighbouring country to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, had attempted to leave Brazil via Argentina.
On Tuesday, the Infobae website reported that the Baires Fly aviation company had allegedly arranged a charter flight for the senator from Argentina to the United States.
"It's all false. He never entered the country," a source at the Security Ministry told the AFP news agency.
Argentina's National Directorate of Migration said in a statement that it had "no record of Flávio Bolsonaro entering the Argentine Republic."
"Following the media frenzy surrounding the presence of a private aircraft at the international airport in Iguazú [Misiones province], the authorities proceeded to carry out the relevant checks on the aircraft and its crew," the statement said.
"The company's documentation is in order, and no flight plan involving the Bolsonaro family was submitted," the migration authority added.
Bolsonaro said in a video on Monday that the courts had barred him from leaving Brazil.
"I never thought of leaving the country. I will hand over my passports and defend myself against this absurdity," the right-wing senator said.
The AFP news agency contacted Brazil's Federal Police and Bolsonaro's campaign coordinator about any possible moves by the politician to leave Brazil, but received no immediate response.
Baires Fly also did not respond to a request for comment.
President Javier Milei's spokesman, Adrián Ravier, said on Tuesday that Bolsonaro had made "no request for asylum."
A Brazilian Supreme Court judge on Tuesday ordered police to investigate possible foreign funding for the conservative senator's campaign.
Bolsonaro has not acknowledged the result of the run-off election, which will allow left-wing President Lula to remain in power until 2030.
Milei, who backed Bolsonaro during his presidential campaign, has not commented on Lula's re-election. He has previously called the Brazilian leader a "thief" and "corrupt," triggering an unprecedented diplomatic crisis between two of Mercosur's leading trading partners.
"In 2023, when Milei was elected president, President Lula made no gesture to congratulate him in person," Ravier said. "There will be no official statement" on the result of Brazil's election, the spokesman added.
– TIMES/AFP
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