Federal police officers leave the headquarters of the Liberal Party during an operation targeting some of former president Jair Bolsonaro's top aides in Brasilia on Feb 8, 2024. (PHOTO / AFP)

BRASILIA - Brazil's Supreme Federal Court on Thursday ordered former president Jair Bolsonaro to hand over his passport to judicial authorities, as they investigate his alleged role in an attempted coup.

Bolsonaro, who has 24 hours to comply with the order, is one of several high-profile officials being investigated in connection with a violent assault on Brazil's capital on Jan 8, 2023, soon after Bolsonaro lost reelection.

The court order is part of Operation Tempus Veritatis (Hour of Truth) launched Thursday by the Federal Police. It targets Bolsonaro's top aides, including military officers, with 33 arrest warrants and four preventive detention orders, according to local media.

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The operation came after Bolsonaro's former personal secretary, Lieutenant Colonel Mauro Cid, signed a cooperation agreement with the Federal Police.

Brazil's former president Jair Bolsonaro speaks to the press as he leaves the Federal Police headquarters where he gave testimony about his actions related to the Jan 8 attacks on government buildings in the capital, in Brasilia, Brazil, Oct 18, 2023. (PHOTO / AP)

Thursday's operation included search warrants against four former ministers and the arrest of four former aides. Bolsonaro was at his beach house in Rio de Janeiro state when police arrived early on Thursday morning, demanding the document. 

Brazil's federal police are now in possession of the passport, which was in the capital Brasilia, Bolsonaro family spokesman Fabio Wajngarten said on social media.

Bolsonaro's lawyer, Paulo Bueno, had no immediate comment.

"I left the government more than a year ago and I'm still suffering relentless persecution," Bolsonaro told the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper on Thursday. "Forget about me. Someone else is running the country now."

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Bolsonaro has already been ruled politically ineligible until 2030 for spreading election falsehoods, and faces several other criminal probes that could land him in jail. He has denied wrongdoing and calls the investigations politically motivated.

With Reuters inputs