Brazil foreign minister seeks to allay election fears

MADRID – Brazil’s foreign minister says whoever wins his country’s presidential election won’t be able to throw out human rights safeguards.

Aloysio Nunes insisted Thursday that Brazil has “well-established parameters” on an independent judiciary, a free press and foreign policy, whoever comes to power in the Oct. 28 runoff vote.

Nunes made the remarks after declining to comment during an official trip to Madrid on the possibility of front-runner Jair Bolsonaro, a far-right candidate, getting elected.

Bolsonaro has alarmed some with his expressions of nostalgia for Brazil’s 1964-1985 dictatorship and his pledge to restore what he calls “traditional values.”

Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell said at the same news conference that whether Bolsonaro or his rival, left-leaning Fernando Haddad, win, it won’t be “business as usual.”