Brazil's Bolsonaro may need new surgery after being hospitalized

(Reuters) - Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro may undergo a new surgery, which would be his fifth since being stabbed while campaigning in 2018, after feeling strong abdominal pain during an event with supporters in northeastern Brazil, he posted on X on Saturday.

Bolsonaro was hospitalized on Friday in the state of Rio Grande do Norte, forcing him to break off a regional tour aimed at drumming up political support. In his post, the former president said it was still unclear if he would be transferred to do the surgery in a hospital in Brasilia, where he lives, or Sao Paulo.

His doctor Antonio Macedo confirmed to Reuters that tests the medical team ran confirmed that Bolsonaro would need a new surgery, adding that it was up to the former president's family which hospital he would go to. A medical report issued on Saturday morning stated that the president was stable and had slept through the night.

Bolsonaro, 70, felt severe abdominal pain on Friday while visiting the city of Santa Cruz, in the interior of Rio Grande do Norte, as part of a tour of several places in the country. He was then transferred by helicopter to a hospital in Natal.

Bolsonaro, a hard-right former army captain who served as president from 2019 to 2022, has been campaigning around Brazil for Congress to pass an amnesty bill for his supporters who stormed the capital Brasilia after he lost the 2022 election.

Brazil's Supreme Court decided last month to put Bolsonaro on trial for allegedly conspiring to overthrow the government after that electoral loss. He has denied any wrongdoing and called the trial an example of left-wing "lawfare" targeting conservative leaders like himself and France's Marine Le Pen.

Bolsonaro has already been banned from running for office until 2030 for discrediting the country's voting system. If the Supreme Court finds him guilty, he could face a long prison sentence.

Still, the right-wing leader insists he will run in next year's presidential election, casting himself as the best candidate to confront leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, whose popularity has slipped amid high inflation.

Bolsonaro nearly died after being stabbed during his presidential campaign in 2018, which he ultimately won, resulting in multiple follow-up surgeries.

(Reporting by Ricardo Brito and Paula Laier, writing by Manuela Andreoni; editing by Diane Craft)