At the top of the Amazon of Belém, Lula achieves diplomatic success despite limited progress

2023-08-10 02:31:28
Representatives from Latin America, Africa and Europe pose around Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, during the summit in Belém (Brazil), August 9, 2023. ERALDO PERES / AP

This is the image he dreamed of: this Wednesday, August 9, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, beaming, posed for the photographers, surrounded by representatives from Latin America, Africa and Europe. All are holding hands, united around the Brazilian president, against the backdrop of a large wall covered with tropical vegetation. A triumphant cliché, as this proven expert in the art of communication is so fond of.

Lula had reason to be satisfied. On August 8 and 9, the 77-year-old leftist leader achieved a real tour de force by organizing a major “Amazon summit” in Belém. Officially planned as a simple meeting of the very discreet and very sleepy Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (OCTA), the meeting turned into a general mobilization for the preservation of the forest and the environment.

In addition to the eight members of OCTA (Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Guyana, Ecuador, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela), were present in Belém the presidents of Congo-Brazzaville and the Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as a representative of Indonesia. Envoys from Norway and Germany, the main financiers of the Amazon Fund, made the trip, as did Sultan Al-Jaber, president of COP28 in Dubai.

Here, the most noticeable absentee was undoubtedly Emmanuel Macron. The French president, who had publicly committed to the defense of the Amazon against Jair Bolsonaro in 2019, did not respond, despite repeated invitations from Brasilia and the strategic situation of Guyana, whose territory is 90% covered with rainforest. Paris, who likes to present herself in “Amazon State”was finally represented only by its only ambassador in Brazil, Brigitte Collet.

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No matter: Lula did not shun his pleasure. “It is a cause for great joy to meet the presidents of South American countries to discuss the Amazon”, he enthused at the opening of the debates, noting that the OCTA had curiously not met for fourteen years. Solemnly, the president said he was certain that the summit would mark a “turning” and even “a before and after in the history of the Amazon”.

river text

In the end, the discussions gave birth to a “Declaration of Belém”, a river text in 113 points, calling for the need for a “urgent action to avoid the point of no return in the Amazon”, i.e. the destruction of more than a fifth of the forest, which would definitively compromise its role as a CO₂ reservoir. In detail, the declaration creates an “Amazonian Alliance to fight against deforestation”, provides for the creation of an international police cooperation center in Manaus and envisages an integrated regional air traffic control system to combat drugs and gold panning.

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