The Brazilian government has officially apologized for the torture suffered by former President Dilma Rousseff at the hands of the military dictatorship when she was a young activist in the 1970s, AFP reported.

Rousseff, who is close to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was part of a Marxist guerrilla group fighting against the dictatorship that ruled the country from 1964 to 1985.

Arrested in 1970 at the age of 22, she was thrown into prison and tortured, including with electric shocks.

“The Brazilian state apologizes for all the atrocities that the dictatorial state inflicted on you and your family,” Ana Maria Lima de Oliveira, chair of the amnesty commission set up to deal with the legacy of the military regime, said Thursday during a meeting in Brazil.

Rousseff, 77, had been seeking official recognition of the violence she suffered.

In 2022, during the government of far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, the commission rejected her request, but Rousseff appealed the decision. She has now won her appeal and will receive compensation of around $17,700.

Rousseff spent nearly three years behind bars before entering politics in the 1980s. When Lula came to power in 2003, he appointed her energy minister, then chief of staff, and finally his successor.

She took office in 2011 as Brazil's first female president, winning a second term that ended prematurely with her impeachment on charges of manipulating public spending.

Since 2023, Rousseff has been president of the New Development Bank of BRICS. | BGNES