Lula says Brazil will not be treated like ‘tinpot country’ after US designates gangs as terrorists

Marco Rubio made announcement after meeting president's far-right challenger Flavio Bolsonaro

Brazil will not be treated as a tinpot country," the country's president, Luiz Inacio da Silva, said on Friday after the United States designated Brazil's two largest criminal gangs, the First Capital Command (PCC) and the Red Command, as foreign terrorist organisations.

The announcement, made by Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, on Thursday, is being widely seen in Brazil as a setback for Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the president who had strongly opposed the designation - and a boost for Lula's main challenger in October's presidential election, the far-right senator Flavio Bolsonaro.