The President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), said this Friday (14th), in a conversation with journalists in Beijing, China, that the US encourages war by supplying weapons to Ukraine. “It is necessary for the United States to stop encouraging war and start talking about peace. It is necessary for the European Union to start talking about peace so that we can convince Putin and Zelensky [presidentes da Rússia e da Ucrânia, respectivamente] that peace interests everyone — and war is only interested, for the time being, in both of us,” he said.
Lula compared the war to a family dispute and a strike, “which we don’t know how it ends”, and suggested the creation of a group of countries with “good relations” with Russia and Ukraine to discuss the end of the conflict. “It is necessary to have patience to talk with the president of Russia. It is necessary to have patience to talk with the president of Ukraine. But it is necessary, above all, to convince the countries that are supplying arms and encouraging war, to stop”, he said.
The head of the federal executive demanded “good will” to put an end to the war and said that China has the “most important” role in the negotiation. “It is necessary to find countries in the world that are willing. Brazil is willing. China is willing. I think we have to find other allies and negotiate with people who can help”, he defended.
The President of the Republic denied that the visit to Chinese territory would cause political tension with the American government. “I am sure that our relationship with China is not necessarily capable of creating any scratches with the United States.”
“When I go to talk to the United States, I am not worried about what China will think of my conversation with the United States. I am talking about my country’s sovereign interests. When I come to talk to China, I do too I’m not worried about what the United States is thinking,” he argued.
According to Lula, the agreements signed by Brazil have no ideological bias and concern national interests. “Brazil has to make possible agreements with all countries. We do not have political choices, ideological choices. We have a choice of national interest — the interest of the Brazilian people, the interest of national industry, the interest of our sovereignty,” he said.