Brazil’s federal police have launched an investigation into a possible “terrorist act” after a double explosion near the Supreme Court in Brasilia on Wednesday night, the police director said today.

Investigators are working between two scenarios – which are not mutually exclusive – those of a “terrorist act” and an attempt to “violently overthrow the rule of law,” Andrey Passos Rodríguez, Director General of the Federal Police, said at a press conference.

A man armed with explosives was killed in Brasilia last night after he tried unsuccessfully to break into the building housing Brazil’s Supreme Court — a botched “attack,” authorities said. “This citizen approached the Federal Supreme Court, tried to enter, failed and there was an explosion in front of the entrance,” Brasilia Governor Celina Leau said yesterday. Based on initial information, it was a “suicide,” Ms. Leau added. The man was found dead in front of the building of Brazil’s top judicial institution after two powerful explosions, which led to the hasty evacuation of all those in the building.

First there was an explosion in a car in a parking lot near the Parliament which belonged to the attacker Then, “this person approached the Federal Supreme Court, tried to enter, failed and an explosion occurred in front of the door,” he told the press in the evening of Wednesday Selina Leao. According to the first information, it is a “suicide”, the official continued, referring to the tracks of a “lone wolf”.

The Federal Supreme Court is located in the Square of the Three Powers, a very short distance from the parliament and the Planalto (the seat of the presidency) in Brasilia. According to a representative of his services, Lula was not in the presidential palace when the two explosions occurred, with a difference of about 20 seconds from one another.

Investigations are continuing to identify the motive of the attacker, in an incident that puts the country on alert just days before the G20 summit.

Brazilian police found explosives in the house where the alleged attacker lived, the Federal District government announced today.

Laiana Costa, an employee of the Court of Auditors, who is also in the area, told reporters that she saw “a man walking by”, and then “suddenly I heard a bang, I looked back and saw fire and smoke”.

The body of the attacker was removed this morning (local time), having been placed inside a large black plastic bag, an AFP journalist said.

Police identified the assailant as Francisco Wanderlei Luis. During the 2020 local elections, he was a candidate for municipal councilor of the Liberal Party of Jáich Bolsonaro, the far-right president at the time. Bolsonaro’s camp spoke of an “isolated incident” caused by a “miscreant”.

In a message of appeasement to X, Bolsonaro called, unusually for him, for “dialogue” and “unity”. “I appeal to all political trends and leaders of national institutions to, at this moment of tragedy, take the necessary steps to move towards national peace,” he wrote.

This attempted attack evoked memories of the Bolsonaro riots. On January 8, 2023, a week after Lula returned to power, thousands of supporters of Bolsonaro, his far-right predecessor who was defeated in elections at the end of 2022, stormed and caused extensive damage to all three institutions in this square, before authorities to regain control of the situation.

Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes said today that the alleged attacker attempted to break into the Supreme Court to blow up the building. As the judge said, the suicide bombing that ended with the death of the bomber was the result of hatred directed against the Supreme Court, hatred created during the previous government of far-right Bolsonaro that led to the riots of January 8, 2023.

Yesterday’s attack comes at a critical juncture: next Monday and Tuesday, Lula will be the host in Rio of the G20 summit, where the heads of state and government of the world’s twenty largest economies are expected. On Wednesday, the Brazilian president is scheduled to welcome Chinese President Xi Jinping to Brasilia.

The president received numerous ambassadors there this morning, who entered through other access entrances rather than the main entrance, a photojournalist pointed out.

Brazilian Vice President Geraldo Alkmin, speaking from Baku, Azerbaijan where he is attending the COP29 conference, called the events “sad” and “serious” and called for the investigation to be “extremely fast and rigorous.” “It is an attack against an institution of the Republic, the power of the Republic,” he said.