Brazil: A Suicidal Veto
By: Atilio Boron
October 29, 2024 Hour: 10:40 am
Lula da Silva will have a difficult task ahead if he wants his country to regain its credibility and influence.
The Brazilian government’s unforgivable veto against Venezuela’s entry into BRICS+ is no surprise. There are deep-rooted differences between the regional and international projects of Itamaraty and the Venezuelan government.
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This conflict, sometimes latent and other times manifest, has persisted independently of Lula’s views during his first eight years in office. Following many diplomatic frictions, the truth is that relations between Brasilia and Caracas only normalized after the defeat of the FTAA in November 2005.
However, the tensions between both governments, especially between their respective foreign ministries, were like embers covered in ash—seemingly extinguished but needing only a slight breeze to rekindle. And the wind blew strong in the steppes of Kazan.
For diplomats of Brazilian sub-imperialism—I invoke Ruy Mauro Marini’s term here—the international stance of Chavez, his tireless hyperactivity, and his strongly anti-imperialist rhetoric and practices (such as the creation of Petrocaribe, for example) caused barely disguised disdain among Itamaraty’s leadership from the outset.
One must understand that, unlike in most countries, the “relative autonomy” enjoyed by the Brazilian foreign ministry within the state apparatus often allows its decisions and proposals to prevail over those of the sitting president, especially when that president is a civilian. This powerful sub-imperial bureaucracy operates under an axiom: alignment, or at least non-confrontation, with U.S. foreign policy.
The objective of this tacit alignment with Washington is to preserve the stability of the neocolonial order in South America and, as much as possible, prevent the emergence of anti-imperialist governments or, when that is impossible, act as a moderating force.
In return, the White House endorses Brazil’s leadership in the region and even opens doors for its representatives in certain areas of the post-war institutional framework, such as the World Trade Organization.
This is why Hugo Chavez’s increasing international influence subjected the pact between Brasilia and Washington to intense strains. During much of Lula’s first term (2003-2007), the clashes between Caracas and Brasilia were undeniable.
The Republican administration repeatedly requested that Brasilia intervene to calm the waters Chavez was stirring, a tension that would soon increase with the progress of the first progressive wave and the elections that brought figures like Evo Morales, Rafael Correa, Cristina Fernandez, Fernando Lugo, Tabare Vazquez, and “Mel” Zelaya to power.
Later, the creation of UNASUR followed. Washington went so far as to send Condoleezza Rice to Brazil to ask Lula to mediate with Chavez, urging that Caracas not terminate a military cooperation agreement between the United States and Venezuela that had been in place for some thirty years and also to find out why Chavez had purchased 70,000 rifles from Spain. Naturally, this mediation had no effect.
Disagreements between Brasilia and Caracas continued for some time, and listing them all would be as long as it would be tedious. Let us recall just two: the Lula government’s opposition to the practical implementation of the Bank of the South, solemnly founded in December 2007 but stalled from its inception largely due to Brazil’s reluctance, or Brazil’s persistent refusal to admit Venezuela into Mercosur.
Given these precedents, the behavior of the Brazilian delegation in Kazan was predictable. Lula’s absence due to a mysterious “domestic accident” will remain one of the great mysteries of the Kazan Summit. Perhaps it was somewhat influenced by Brazil’s unfortunate vote at the UN condemning the “Russian invasion” of Ukraine.
However, the reality is that, with the veto against Venezuela’s entry as an associate member of BRICS+—a category into which Bolivia and Cuba were admitted—Brazil’s international prestige and the necessary solidarity among Latin American countries have been seriously damaged.
Lula’s government gave in to the conservative pressure from within his own coalition and from the United States, for whom isolating Venezuela is essential to continue its criminal blockade of that country with impunity. It is not the same to attack a country in isolation as it is to do so when it has already joined BRICS+.
What happened tarnishes Brazil’s image and makes its government appear as a compliant partner of Washington, operating in Latin America to foster disconnection, if not outright “disintegration,” among the region’s countries, fostering suspicion about Itamaraty’s future intentions on the international stage.
For this reason, Lula’s move in Kazan is a “suicidal veto” because it weakens Brazil’s international influence not only in Latin America but worldwide. Brazilian analyst Jose Luis Fiori put it bluntly: “A divided South America is losing geopolitical and geoeconomic relevance, and its small, isolated ‘primary-exporting’ units are utterly irrelevant on the global geopolitical stage.”
An alternative would be to build an axis between Brazil, Argentina, and Venezuela, but this was broken this year with Milei’s rejection of Argentina’s entry into BRICS+ and Brazil’s veto against Venezuela joining that organization.
With this veto, the Brazilian government deprived BRICS+ of the enormous advantage it would gain by incorporating the country with the world’s largest proven oil reserve. Objectively, it weakened BRICS+, to Washington’s delight.
For this reason, I believe this veto will not last, and Lula will ultimately be discredited, as few errors can be more severe in today’s world than leaving such a vast oil reserve at the mercy of the United States, something neither China, Russia, nor even India would welcome.
The issue is that Itamaraty does not believe the international stage has yet become a multipolar system, leading to its misguided decision to veto Venezuela’s entry into BRICS+. It continues to bet on the declining U.S. hegemony and a decaying “rules-based world order” through which the United States defends its national interests.
The Bolivarian foreign ministry was right to label the veto “a hostile gesture, adding to the criminal sanctions policy imposed on a brave and revolutionary people.” To say “adding to,” in careful diplomatic language, is to say that Brazil acted as a diligent pawn of Washington, endorsing the more than 900 unilateral coercive measures affecting that brotherly nation and showing a regrettable lack of solidarity.
Did Lula not realize that during the pandemic, under the deplorable Jair Bolsonaro administration, people were dying in Manaus hospitals due to lack of oxygen, and President Nicolas Maduro ordered the delivery of 107 doctors and six tankers with a total of 136,000 liters of oxygen to address the dire situation in that city’s hospitals? Is this how Brazil repays that solidarity?
A lamentable and unforgivable veto. President Lula will have a difficult task ahead if he wants his country to regain its credibility and influence not only in the Latin American and Caribbean region but also with the main BRICS+ partners, particularly China, Russia, and India. It will likely not be long before this ill-fated veto is reversed and the Brazilian president faces a bitter humiliation.
Autor: Atilio Boron
Fuente: teleSUR
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