Paulo Sotero – O Estado de S. Paulo, 12/20/2009 (summary from Portuguese)
A negative feeling is quickly replacing the good will toward the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Brazil’s growing international presence that prevailed in Washington until a few months ago. Criticism against the United States and President Barack Obama made publicly by senior Brazilian officials indicate that the feeling is mutual.
Differences between Brazil and the United States over Honduras and other minor issues certainly helped create animosity. This is mainly instigated, however, by Lula’s decision to lend his personal prestige and Brazil’s international credibility to the leader of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, hosting him in Brasilia and then offering the services of Brazil as a freelance mediator on the serious confrontation between Tehran and Washington and its allies over the Iranian nuclear program. The initiative mobilized the influential pro-Israel lobby in Washington, which could harm Brazilian commercial interests.
Also, the statement made by Lula on the lack of “moral authority” of the United States to negotiate issues of nuclear non-proliferation raised eyebrows in Washington. At that same time, Foreign Minister Celso Amorim was dispatched to Iran to an unlikely mission with Ahmadinejad, after Tehran rejected the proposal presented by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
The American perplexity was reinforced by signs that Lula let himself be used by the Iranian leader, as well as information published by the Brazilian press and attributed to diplomatic sources in Brasilia, in which Lula had acted in the case of Iran with encouragement from Washington. According to a senior official, Brazilian diplomats extrapolated circumstantial statements like “good luck” they heard from fellow Americans diplomats after Ahmadinejad’s visit was confirmed.
It’s striking in Washington what a congressional aide called the “schizophrenia” of Brazilian diplomacy. According to an aide, for a government concerned with “moral authority” in the external front, it should be evident the contradiction between Brazil’s insistence in the strictest respect for the rules of democracy in Honduras and the official endorsement of Ahmadinejad, who came to power after a fraudulent election.
The negative perception of foreign policy at the end of the Lula government is certainly influenced by criticism stated by senior Brazilian diplomats such as Rubens Ricupero, Rubens Barbosa, and Roberto Abdenur, all former ambassadors in the United States.
“It is understandable that governments take foreign policy decisions targeting domestic goals, but it is hard to see any political gain that Brazil could obtain from reducing itself to a supporting position to the policies of Venezuela and Iran,” said a high government source. The official predicted that one should not expect significant gestures by the United States, such as an Obama visit to Brazil, which once was, but is no longer, on the agenda. Realistically, the best news is the resumption of full diplomatic dialogue with the next year’s arrival in Brasília of the new American ambassador, Thomas A. Shannon, and the new ambassador of Brazil in Washington, Mauro Vieira.
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