Thousands attend Rio's Simpatia Quase Amor carnival

Thousands of revellers on Saturday danced to samba and partied in a pre-carnival street event alongside Rio de Janeiro's iconic Ipanema Beach.

The 36th edition of the "Simpatia Quase Amor" kept its usual political tone, after the city's Mayor Marcelo Crivella attempted to bring forward the start time of annual street party.

Revellers chanted lyrics which made references to Crivella's failed attempt to change the event's start time.

"Simpatia Quase Amor," which takes place a week before the carnival's main sambadrome parades, roughly translates from Portuguese to English as "Friendliness is Almost Love".

resident Jair Bolsonaro addressed tens of thousands of evangelicals on a Rio de Janeiro beach Saturday, telling them Brazil’s government is working to restore morality in Latin America’s largest nation, just as pre-Carnival festivities get under way.

Brazil “is changing because it has a government that respects family, owes loyalty to its people, and believes in God,” Bolsonaro told the cheering crowd, across the bay from Rio’s Sugarloaf Mountain.

“I’m Christian and I believe Brazil can reach its well-deserved place of prominence on the world stage,” the far-right politician later added.

His address came days after a Cabinet shuffle that installed a general as his new chief of staff, boosting the number of military members in his administration that in 2019 was influenced more by the “ideological wing” of cultural conservatives.