Temer digs heels after creating graft history in Latin America

Brazilian President Michel Temer considers bribery charges against him “absurd”, a source in his office said on Tuesday as Latin America’s biggest country plunged into new political turmoil.

Temer, the first sitting President of Brazil to face criminal charges, is accused of accepting bribes from a giant meatpacking company. He is also under investigation for obstruction of justice and belonging to a criminal organisation.

But Mr Temer has made clear he does not intend to let the scandal, part of a huge corruption probe engulfing scores of politicians, drive him from office.Newspapers Folha de S. Paulo and Globo quoted aides saying that Mr Temer’s strategy would be to attack prosecutor general Rodrigo Janot’s evidence evidence against him as flimsy and politically motivated.

“For personal reasons, the prosecutor general is putting the country at risk and mounting a political crusade,” Folha quoted a presidential aide as saying.

“The President is moving to the phase of total war to save his mandate,” columnist Bernardo Mello Franco wrote.

Mr Temer himself has not commented since Janot filed the charge with the Supreme Court late on Monday. Hours earlier he’d declared: “Nothing will destroy us, not me and not our ministers.”

For him to go on trial, the lower house of Congress must first approve Janot’s charge by a two-thirds majority.