Brazil’s former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has launched a defiant public defence after being convicted of corruption and money laundering, and vowed to run for president next year.

“If anyone thinks that with this sentence they will pull me out of the game, they should know that I am in the game,” Lula told supporters at the headquarters of his Workers’ party a day after he received a nearly 10-year sentence for accepting bribes in return for helping an engineering company win contracts with the state oil company Petroleo Brasileiro, or Petrobras. In a brief, at times emotional speech, Silva told supporters in São Paulo that the court had no proof and the conviction was politically motivated. To cheers, he said he wanted to run for re-election next year. “From this moment, I want to ask the Workers’ party for the right to be a candidate for president,” he shouted.“Lula for president!” the crowd responded.(theguardian)…[+]