Brazilian president denies corruption accusations

Brazilian President Michel Temer on Thursday released a video in which he denied corruption accusations against him.

Temer was one of the dozens of politicians mentioned in the testimonies of former executives of construction company Odebrecht, which said the politicians had benefited from illegal campaign funding.

In the video, Temer said he had meetings with an Odebrecht representative in 2010 during the presidential campaign in which he was elected vice president.

However, he denied that illegal funding was discussed at the meeting, stressing that no wrongdoing was committed.

"It is true that I participated, in 2010, in a meeting with a representative of one of the country's largest companies. It is a lie that I heard any references to financial amounts or shady businesses of the company with politicians. That never happened, neither in that meeting nor in any other meeting I held in my public life with any people or companies," Temer said.

According to former Odebrecht executive Marcio Faria, Temer took part in a meeting which discussed Odebrecht's "purchase" of Temer's party PMDB for 40 million U.S. dollars.

The testimonies, which were made public earlier this week, involved a third of the Brazilian Senate, eight members of Temer's cabinet and 42 House representatives. They will be investigated by the Chief Prosecution Office. Endi