CURITIBA, Brazil (Reuters) – Brazilian police yesterday arrested former government minister Jose Dirceu, one of the most senior members of the ruling Workers’ Party to be detained so far in a corruption scandal engulfing state-run oil company Petrobras.
Dirceu, popular former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s chief of staff between 2003 and 2005, was already under house arrest for running a vote-buying scheme. His involvement in an even larger scandal threatens to bring the investigation closer to Lula and his protégé and successor President Dilma Rousseff.
Federal prosecutor Carlos Fernando dos Santos Lima called Dirceu a key instigator of the Petrobras scandal, saying he took bribes from contractors while in office and continued to receive payments even when he was jailed in late 2013 for the vote-buying scandal in Lula’s first term.
