Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva attends a meeting with mayors from across the country to discuss public policy issues and federal government support for municipalities, Tuesday, March 14, 2023, in Brasilia, Brazil. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s new president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has so far shown little concern about undermining the Western consensus on foreign policy, including in his cooperation with governments authoritarian.

In recent weeks, the Lula government sent a delegation to Nicolás Maduro’s Venezuela, refused to sign a UN resolution condemning human rights violations in Nicaragua, allowed Iranian warships to dock in Rio de Janeiro and categorically refused to send arms to Ukraine, which is at war with Russia.

These decisions have raised eyebrows in the United States and Europe, but experts say Lula is reactivating the principle of non-alignment that Brazil has maintained for decades in order to craft a policy that better protects its interests in an increasingly global world. more multipolar.

Brazil’s foreign policy is based on its 1988 constitution, which establishes non-intervention, self-determination, international cooperation and the peaceful resolution of conflicts as guiding principles.

This involves “talking to all states at all times without making moral judgments, respecting certain red lines,” says Feliciano Guimarães, a political scientist at the Brazilian Center for International Relations, a research group. However, he adds, Lula’s red lines are still unclear.

Last week, a Brazilian delegation led by Celso Amorim, special adviser to the presidency and former foreign minister, traveled to Venezuela for the first high-level official visit in years. Under Lula’s predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil severed diplomatic ties with the neighboring country. Leftist Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has been accused of violating freedom of expression and persecuting political opponents.

Amorim’s team met with Maduro and the opposition. Maduro tweeted photos of the meeting with Amorim, calling it a “beautiful meeting”.

According to a Foreign Ministry official who was not authorized to speak publicly, the Lula government intended to promote democracy in Venezuela and push for greater transparency in the elections, which is why the delegation met with both parties.

At the beginning of March, the Brazilian delegation to the United Nations refused to sign a declaration by the Human Rights Council condemning the regime of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua.

The Ortega government has cracked down on dissent, last month deporting and stripping more than 200 dissidents of their Nicaraguan nationality, prompting international rebuke for what was widely seen as a political setback and a form of exile.

In an interview with the Brazilian newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo, published on March 10, Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira claimed that Brazil had not signed the declaration due to “differences in language and ‘approach”. Vieira highlighted Brazil’s historic position of seeking dialogue first.

But the controversy led the Brazilian government to later stress that it was “extremely concerned” about reports of human rights abuses in Nicaragua and offered to take in political refugees who have been stripped of their rights. Nationality.

Lula made diplomacy a priority during his previous presidency from 2003 to 2010, and Brazil was widely respected internationally. The BRICS group, made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, was created in 2006.

Lula and Amorim held talks with senior US and Iranian officials in an effort to build peace, joining forces with Turkey to negotiate a halt to Iran’s uranium enrichment. Ultimately, these efforts failed and Iran continued to enrich uranium.

Lula is seeking to reintegrate Brazil onto the world stage after a period when Bolsonaro showed little interest in international affairs beyond asserting his affinities with other right-wing nationalists such as Israeli Benjamin Netanyahu and Hungarian Viktor Orbán. Bolsonaro even reserved special adulation for former US President Donald Trump.

Bolsonaro’s trips abroad were few and sporadic. Instead, Lula quickly showed a different course and within the first month of his presidency, he traveled to Argentina to meet his counterpart, Alberto Fernández.

The president who returned to the Planalto Palace also wants to create a group of countries, possibly including India, China and Indonesia, to mediate possible peace talks between Russia and Ukraine.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin said Moscow was considering Lula’s proposal, Russian news agency Tass reported in February. He also shared this proposal with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a video call on March 2.

However, Lula’s refusal to send weapons to the invaded country upset the West.

“Lula’s government applies the same principle of autonomy as in its first terms, but the global scenario has changed,” warns political scientist Leonardo Paz of the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a university and think tank.

The West’s tensions with Russia and China are now more acute, but Russia is a key supplier of fertilizer for Brazil’s soybean farms, and its exports have become dependent on the Chinese market.

China overtook the United States as Brazil’s largest trading partner in 2009. Since then, their economic relationship has only grown stronger. Between 2007 and 2020, China invested the equivalent of $66.1 billion in Brazil, according to the Brazil-China Business Council.

“Brazil needs a strategy that allows it to maneuver. The principle of non-alignment allows you to have open channels with all states to protect yourself,” comments political scientist Guimarães.

Brazil has shown its willingness to defend a foreign policy independent of the United States and European countries by allowing the docking of two Iranian warships, adds Guimarães.

The move drew criticism from both the United States and Israel. “Accessing Iranian navy ships sends the wrong message,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre warned during a press briefing on March 9.

“But Brazil is a sovereign country and it can afford to make its own decisions about how it will behave with another country,” he added.

Another indication of Lula’s budding foreign policy came this week with the announcement that from October 1, Brazil will reinstate the requirement for citizens of the United States and three other nations to obtain tourist visas. , which Bolsonaro had abolished even though these four countries will continue to require visas from Brazilians.

Bolsonaro’s decision represents “a break with the model of Brazilian migration policy, which has always been based on the principles of reciprocity and equal treatment,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Monday.

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Bridi reported from Brasilia.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva waves during a Bolsa Familia program relaunch ceremony at the Planalto Palace, in Brasilia, Brazil, Thursday, March 2, 2023. Bolsa Familia is a cash transfer program that aims help families living in poverty (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva waves during a Bolsa Familia program relaunch ceremony at the Planalto Palace, in Brasilia, Brazil, Thursday, March 2, 2023. Bolsa Familia is a cash transfer program that aims help families living in poverty (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)

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