Brazil to hold emergency cabinet meeting

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has called an emergency meeting of her cabinet amid nationwide demonstrations with the participation of over a million protesters.

The cabinet meeting is due to be held on Friday. Reports say authorities are frightened after the angry protesters attempted to storm the Brazilian Foreign Ministry building in the capital, Brasilia.

Rousseff has called off a trip to Japan due to the rising tide of demonstrations in the country.

Recent protests in Brazil erupted on June 2. The demonstrations are against hikes in transport fare – from three to 3.20 reals ($1.38 to $1.47).

The protests continued on Thursday, a day after the government reversed the increase in bus and subway fares.

Brazil is experiencing the largest protests since 1992, when demonstrators took to the streets to demand the impeachment of then-President Fernando Collor de Mello.

Brazilian protesters have now broadened their demands that the government address the issues of high taxes, inflation, corruption, and poor public services.

On June 20, some 300,000 people protested in the city of Rio de Janeiro, while in Sao Paolo more than 100,000 demonstrators took to the streets.

In the northeastern city of Salvador, police fired tear gas to disperse protesters on a day when 20,000 demonstrators had gathered outside a stadium ahead of a Confederations Cup match between Nigeria and Uruguay.

Tens of thousands of protesters also marched around the Congress and the Supreme Court buildings in the capital. The protesters set a small fire outside the foreign ministry building.

Around 80 demonstrators, some with homemade explosives, stormed the foreign ministry building before they were driven back by police forces.

Meanwhile, a protester died after a motorist hit him and two others in the city of Ribeirao Preto, located 330 kilometers (200 miles) from Sao Paulo, police said.

The protesters are also angry at more than $26 billion of public money that will be spent on the two major sporting events of the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics in Brazil.