Brazil’s highest electoral court has barred former President Jair Bolsonaro from running for political office until 2030, after finding him guilty of abusing his power and misusing public media during last year’s election campaign.

Five out of seven judges found the former president guilty, effectively ending any hope of a political comeback in the forthcoming 2026 election. Two of the judges voted against the decision, which prevents Bolsonaro from running for public office for eight years.

Mr Bolsonaro was found guilty of abusing his power ahead of last year's presidential poll.

He had been accused of undermining Brazilian democracy by falsely claiming that the electronic ballots used were vulnerable to hacking and fraud.

Mr Bolsonaro's lawyers are expected to appeal against the verdict.

They have argued that his statements had no bearing on the election result.

The ban is backdated to 2 October 2022, when the presidential election took place.

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro will not be allowed to run for office again until 2030. 

Electoral judges voted on Friday to ban the former leader from public leadership for eight years. 

The court determined that Bolsonaro attacked public confidence in the country's democratic institutions and deemed the former leader a threat to political tensions.

The decision was made with four out of seven votes by the Superior Electoral Court.

Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing on Friday (April 14), as part of an official state visit to China where the two leaders will discuss climate change, the conflict in Ukraine, and a range of other topics.

Ahead of the meeting, Lula told Brazilian media that China was “an essential partner today for Brazil and for Latin America.”

Brazil’s left-wing President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva reportedly embarrassed the Biden administration on Monday by allowing two Iranian warships to dock in Rio de Janeiro, only a few weeks after President Joe Biden rolled out the red carpet for Lula in Washington.

The Biden administration has been obsequious to hardline socialist Lula after his narrow victory over incumbent Jair Bolsonaro in the October election. Biden fawned over Lula’s victory and ostentatiously invited him to visit Washington on January 9, the day after Bolsonaro loyalists rioted in Brasilia.

Criticism of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's economic policies grew on Wednesday, with analysts and a leading newspaper slamming ministers after local markets tanked in the leftist's first two days in office.

Financial Minister Fernando Haddad, a Lula loyalist who ran a failed presidential bid as the leftist Workers Party candidate in 2018, has been among the main targets, with his hometown newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo dubbing him a "decorative minister" on Wednesday.

Six weeks before taking power, Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Wednesday told cheering crowds at the U.N. climate conference that he would crack down on illegal deforestation in the Amazon, reinitiate relationships with countries that finance forest protection efforts and push to host an upcoming world climate summit in the rainforest.

Truckers and other protesters on Tuesday blocked highways for a second day in support of President Jair Bolsonaro, who had yet to accept his election loss to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. In Novo Hamburgo, near the southern city of Porto Alegre, police fired teargas on Tuesday to break up a protest on one major highway, according to an AFP photographer.

Brazil’s left-wing former president Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, commonly known as Lula, narrowly won a tightly contested presidential election tonight with a margin of just under 2%.

With 50% of precincts reporting, Bolsonaro clung to a narrow 0.5% lead, but the general trend over the course of the evening was a slow and steady upswing for Lula, as votes trickled in from the northeast. Just before 7pm, with 72% of precincts reporting, Lula took his first lead of the night, and continued to expand his lead.

Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva has been elected the next president of Brazil, in a stunning comeback following a tight run-off race on Sunday. His victory heralds a political about-face for Latin America’s largest country, after four years of Jair Bolsonaro’s far-right administration.