Fernando Bulhões da Câmara accused of crimes of attempted coercion and persecution
A former candidate for PCP communists in the last municipal elections faces trial for one crime of attempted coercion and another of persecution, allegedly committed against the leader of the Association of Ukrainians in Portugal, Pavlo Sadokha, writes Correio da Manhã today.
According to the accusation of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, Fernando Bulhões da Câmara, 77, a former military veteran who was the ‘number two’ in the PCP/ PEV coalition standing for a municipality on the island of Azores in 2021, “began sending messages and making threatening phone calls to Pavlo Sadohka on April 18, 2022.
The communications came in the context that Mr Sadokha had just denounced NGOs with connections to the Russian embassy working in Portugal “as if they were Ukrainain”.
During the first phone call, the “defendant told Pavlo Sadokha that he should stop his hate messages against Russians and leave the country immediately. If he didn’t, he (said) would kill him”, the accusation reportedly continues.
“Over the following days the phone calls were repeated, with similar threats, which continued through the summer through messages with photos and violent videos. The last threat arrived on September 27”.
CM says it has contacted Mr Bulhões da Câmara, who “guarantees that he did not threaten anyone and just telephoned for the Association of Ukrainians in Portugal.
“According to Fernando Bulhões da Câmara a complaint against Pavlo Sadohka has been presented because ‘this man is involving criminal activity in Portugal. He will certainly be judged for the crimes of diffusing Nazi ideology’”, Bulhões da Câmara is quoted as having told the paper.
However, according to CM information gathering, “right now there is no investigation into the leader of the Association of Ukrainians in Portugal.
“At the age of 77, Fernando Bulhões da Câmara has no previous criminal history – a detail that is mentioned in the Public Prosecutor’s accusation. He has lived in Moscow, and recently left the Azores, living now in the centre of the country with his wife, whose nationality is Russian”, the paper adds, stressing in a box beside the main story that the public prosecutors’ accusation calls for the defendant “not to be condemned for more than five years in jail”.
Mr Bulhões da Câmara meantime has told CM: “I fought in Angola against the MPLA, and was on the side of Captain Salgueiro Maia, in Carmo, on April 25. I am not a criminal. I have a right to unmask this man” (referring to Pavlo Sadokha).
Source material: Correio da Manhã
