SÃO PAULO, Brazil – Andre Esteves, the Brazilian billionaire who transformed BTG Pactual into the largest independent investment bank in Latin America, was arrested in the corruption probe that has shaken the country's political and economic leadership.
The former treasurer of Brazil's ruling party, João Vaccari, was sentenced Monday to more than 15 years in prison for his role in a massive corruption scandal at state oil giant Petrobras.
Brazilian police have asked the Supreme Court for permission to question former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who they say may have benefited from the corruption scandal roiling state oil giant Petrobras.
Huge numbers of protesters demanded Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff's resignation Sunday, blaming her and the leftist Workers' Party for runaway corruption and looming recession in Latin America's biggest country.
José Dirceu, once one of the most powerful figures in the Workers' Party, will be held under preventive detention. He is serving the remainder of a prison term under house arrest for his role in a previous cash-for-votes scandal known as the "Mensalão," or "big monthly payment."
At the center of this story is another state-run company, Eletrobras, and its Angra III project, a nuclear power plant tucked into a bay with jungle-covered islands that have become something of a playground for Brazil's rich and famous.
Latin America has been plagued by corruption for centuries, ever since it emerged from what the Mexican poet Octavio Paz called the “patrimonialist” nature of Spanish and Portuguese colonial rule. What is different today is the response to it, with societies and institutions refusing to remain complicit in corruption, or resigning themselves to its inevitability.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has lost support from Senate Chief Renan Calheiros and his lower-house counterpart, Eduardo Cunha, amid growing discontent with a recession and a corruption probe into legislators.
BRASILIA, Brazil — Police arrested the treasurer of Brazil's ruling Workers' Party on Wednesday, bringing the country's largest corruption scandal a step closer to President Dilma Rousseff's government.
