Former Mines and Energy Minister Bento Albuquerque recently indicated that a “sent” of the government of Saudi Arabia had given two packages to his delegation at the end of an official visit to Riyadh in which Jair Bolsonaro had not participated, in October 2021. Upon his return to Brazil, customs officers at the international airport de Guarulhos, near Sao Paulo, found one of these parcels in the luggage of one of the Minister’s assistants. He was seized by the authorities because he had not been declared beforehand.
Subsequently, senior Bolsonaro government officials tried at least eight times to recover the jewelry by pressuring customs authorities, according to the Estado de S. Paulo daily, which revealed the case. A final attempt was made at the end of December, just days before the handover. Without success. The jewels remain preserved, until this day, in a safe of the airport where they were intercepted, indicates AFP.
For its part, the other package was given to Jair Bolsonaro, without having been checked by customs. But the ex-president assured CNN Brazil that he had not committed “no illegality”.