Jan 27 2023 | Nº. 51

Editorial

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva visited Argentina and Uruguay this week, fulfilling an earlier promise that the first foreign trip of his third term would be within Latin America. In Argentina, Lula met first bilaterally with President Alberto Fernández. Since his election in 2019, Fernández has been among the most eager Lula allies in the region. He enthusiastically celebrated Lula’s election, attended the inauguration, and warmly welcomed him to Buenos Aires this week. Fernández displayed genuine affection for Lula, but there is also a clear political benefit to his proximity with the popular Brazilian. Among the issues Lula and Fernández discussed was the creation of a common trade unit—not a shared currency, as has been widely and erroneously reported—to reduce both countries’ dependence on the dollar. If the plan takes off, other South American countries would reportedly be invited to use the unit as well.

The primary reason for Lula’s visit to Argentina was the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) summit. Founded in 2010 as a counterpoint to the U.S.-dominated Organization of American States (OAS), CELAC is composed of thirty-three countries—including Venezuela and Cuba. Lula took the opportunity to reiterate Brazil’s support for a policy of non-intervention in the region. “In the same way that I am against territorial occupation, as Russia did to Ukraine,” Lula stated in his address, “I am against much interference in the process of Venezuela.” Lula’s return to CELAC after Bolsonaro withdrew from the body early in his administration marked a reassertion of Brazil’s leadership role in the region. Under previous Workers’ Party governments, South America was seen as a kind of sphere of influence for Brazil, which presented or co-sponsored a series of policies and platforms aimed at regional integration. Reviving this approach figured prominently in Lula’s campaign. He is clearly excited by the prospect of renewed Brazilian leadership in its own neighborhood. 

On Wednesday, January 25, President Lula then visited President Luis Lacalle Pou of Uruguay, as well as former leftwing President José Pepe Mujica. Lula was received by a large, enthusiastic  crowd in Montevideo. 

The Brazilian government’s approach to diplomacy in South America is primed to succeed with amenable, democratic allies in power in Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, and Colombia. It will be tested if political winds shift. This year, for example, Argentinians will go to the polls. How would the election of a conservative affect Lula’s agenda? The ongoing crisis in Peru was also an urgent topic of discussion at the CELAC summit. What challenge does instability there pose to aspirations of regional integration? There are potential obstacles ahead, but Lula’s first international trip indicated both momentum and goodwill at this early stage. At the very least at the level of intent, Brazil is back as a hemispheric power.

Highlights

• YANOMAMI TRAGEDY. On January 20, the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva declared a state of emergency in the Yanomami Indigenous territory in the Amazonian state of Roraima after almost 600 children died and hundreds were diagnosed with malaria, pneumonia and other symptoms linked to the contamination by mercury that is used in illegal mining operations in the region.

• PRESIDENT'S VISIT. The following day Lula traveled to the state, accompanied by members of a task force comprising eight ministers and other health professionals. Lula's attitude contrasts sharply with the neglect of his predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, whose government was consistently hostile towards Indigenous peoples and encouraged mining and the invasion of demarcated territories. In 1995, when Bolsonaro was still a member of Congress, he even proposed a law to extinguish the legal existence of the Yanomami Indigenous territory, which had been created in 1991.

• PERSISTENT NEGLECT. The situation of the Yanomami was classified by the Lula government as a humanitarian crisis. From 2018 to mid-2021, 262 indigenous children in the region were considered malnourished. From July 2021 to July 2022, another 273 children were treated in this condition, 80 percent of whom were under 5 years of age. The decline in these children’s health occurred precisely the years when Bolsonaro was in power. On his social networks, the former president declared that Indigenous health had been a priority of his administration and that the facts reported in the press are a “leftwing farce.” The Brazilian Supreme Court, however, says it already has evidence that indicates the responsibility of Bolsonaro in aggravating the Yanomami tragedy.

• MILITARY CORRUPTION. The media is also reporting that the Brazilian military was remiss in controlling illegal mining on Indigenous lands. The evidence is contained in two preliminary intelligence reports by FUNAI, the federal government agency that handles Indigenous issues in Brazil. The documents are from 2019, the first year of Jair Bolsonaro's government. The ministry of defense and the Brazilian army were questioned by the press about the reports, but did not comment.

• THE CRIME OF GENOCIDE. The International Criminal Court is already examining complaints against Bolsonaro for possibly having committed the crime of genocide against Brazilian Indigenous people. The original accusation concerns the actions of the Bolsonaro government in Indigenous lands during the Covid-19 pandemic. However, now legal experts, such as Brazilian Judge Sylvia Steiner, who sat on the bench at the International Criminal Court from 2003 to 2016, says that the Yanomami tragedy “makes the evidence of genocide stronger than before.”

• DOM PHILLIPS AND BRUNO. The Federal Police said on Monday, January 23, that drug trafficker Rubens Villar, known as “Colombia,” ordered the murder of British journalist Dom Phillips and Brazilian indigenist Bruno Araújo in June 2022. Colombia is under arrest, but Univaja, an organization that represents the Indigenous peoples of the region, says that the role of the “political world” in their brutal murder remains to be clarified.

• ANTI-COUP PACKAGE. Minister of Justice Flávio Dino will deliver to President Lula a package of measures aimed at curbing any new attempts at a coup d'état carried out by supporters of Bolsonaro. Three measures are expected: the creation of a national force to protect federal buildings, a bill to curb funders of these coup actions, and tools for monitoring content posted by political extremists on social networks. Some of these proposals will have to be approved by the Brazilian Congress.

• LULA IN WASHINGTON. The Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Itamaraty) has announced that President Lula will visit President Joe Biden at the White House on Friday, February 10.

Feature Article

US-Brazil Relations: Close Allies or Distant Neighbors

By Carlos Gustavo Poggio

With each new administration taking office in Brazil or in the United States, speculations begin about what will be its effect on bilateral relationship. What does the future of US-Brazil relations hold with Lula da Silva and Joe Biden in office? How different will it be from the Bolsonaro-Trump rendezvous?

On the one hand, there are obvious opportunities, such as in the field of environment. Both Biden and Lula made environmental concerns a center topic of their campaigns, while both Bolsonaro and Trump famously did not care much about such niceties as clean air or polar ice caps. Biden specifically mentioned Brazil in one of the debates in 2020, which is something of a rarity in US presidential debates. While discussing deforestation, the then-candidate declared that he would be willing to create a 20-billion-dollar fund to compensate Brazil for preserving the Amazon Rainforest. Indeed, the Lula administration would do well to gauge how serious the US president was about it and ask for the invoice in the first year of his administration.

However, a broader overview of the history of US-Brazil relations should make evident that there is no reason to expect profound changes in bilateral interactions due to occasional changes in presidencies. Yes, there have been modifications in tone and style, and there have been sporadic skirmishes, such as the one between the Rousseff and Obama administrations surrounding espionage, as well as mutual declarations of love, such as the recent Bolsonaro-Trump bromance. But there have not been any real transformations, such as signing a free trade agreement or breaking diplomatic relations. In that sense, Brazil-US relations are very much unlike Mexico-US or Argentina-US relations, which historically have had far more ups and downs.

Since its independence, Brazil has always attempted to secure a good yet relatively distant relationship with the US. On the other hand, while Brazil joined the Allies in World War II, Argentina, for example, refused to break relations with the Axis powers in the and became known as the “bad neighbor” in US foreign policy circles. Brazil has never been a genuine priority from the perspective of US foreign policy. The “Latin America” policy of the United States has always been about Mexico first, then Central America and the Caribbean, with South America in general, and Brazil in particular, as afterthoughts.

Occasionally, something may happen that will give material for analysts and political pundits to declare a “new era” in US-Brazil relations. Still, sooner rather than later, things get back to broader historical patterns. More recently, such was the case during the first two years of the Bolsonaro administration, which made the relationship with Donald Trump a cornerstone of its foreign policy strategy. As soon as Trump left the White House, Bolsonaro replaced his previous unconventional – and relatively unskilled – foreign minister with a more household and professional name who quickly scaled back some of the recklessness of his predecessor. With Trump in Mar-a-Lago rather than in the White House, Bolsonaro seemed to rapidly lose interest in foreign policy and let professionals run it.

In that sense, the Lula administration will be following the second and more conventional phase of Bolsonaro’s foreign policy. For example, when it comes to central issues such as the war in Ukraine, it is not at all clear how a Lula administration would be much different from Bolsonaro’s, whose support for Ukraine has been somewhat circumspect. Indeed, the war in Ukraine may become a friction point between the Lula and Biden administrations. Lula has forcefully criticized Zelensky, claiming that the Ukrainian and the Russian presidents are equally responsible for the war. Lula also criticized the sanctions against Russia and said that Biden “could have avoided” the war if he had taken “a plane to Moscow to talk.”

Contrary to Bolsonaro, Lula is known for enjoying actively participating in foreign matters. For example, while Bolsonaro skipped the COP-27 meeting in November, Lula traveled to Egypt and met several world leaders. With the war in Ukraine and its economic and political consequences far from being off the radar, Lula’s proclivity to actively participate in foreign policy may create problems with the Biden administration. But again, this may not have any deeper or long-term consequences. Biden may show some displeasure, Lula may enjoy being in the spotlight standing up to the United States as a way to please his leftist base, but Brazil and the United States will remain distant neighbors.

Carlos Gustavo Poggio, Associate Professor of Political Science at the Berea College, KY. This text was originally written for issue 50 of the WBO Newsletter (Washington Brazil Office), that will be published on January 20, 2023. Fill in the form at the bottom of the text to access and subscribe to the WBO weekly newsletter in English.

Feature articles express the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or WBO.