It was meant to punish the cruellest and most corrupt individuals on the planet.

The Global Magnitsky Act has been used to shame dictators, warlords and corrupt profiteers, freezing their assets and banning them from entering the US.

The toppled dictator of Gambia, Zimbabwe’s strongman president, Chinese officials accused of persecuting Uyghurs, and Saudi operatives suspected of murdering and dismembering a dissident journalist have all fallen foul of it.

Last week, however, Donald Trump deployed arguably the gravest human rights sanctions at his disposal in a novel way, targeting Alexandre de Moraes, the judge investigating Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s populist former president .

Mr Trump has long identified with Mr Bolsonaro , who has been charged with plotting a coup to overturn hi

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