2023-05-31 12:23:54
Presidents of 11 South American countries met in Brasilia this Tuesday (30)
The president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva
said, on Tuesday night (30), that the meeting of 11 South American presidents in Brasília, held at the Itamaraty Palace, was not a group of friends, but leaders of countries in search of regional coordination. It was a response to questions about differences that surfaced with other presidents, such as Chile’s Gabriel Boric and Uruguay’s Luis Lacalle Pou. Both criticized Venezuela for human rights violations and undermining democracy.
“The fact that there are two presidents who did not agree, I don’t know which newspaper they read in. I said that a meeting of Lula’s friends was not called here. A meeting of presidents was called to build a body for the countries,” he said.
At the bilateral meeting between Lula and the president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, on Monday (29), the Brazilian president defended that the neighboring country should disclose its “narrative” about the political and economic situation to counteract the negative narratives made by opponents on the international stage.
“I was surprised when it was said that what happens in Venezuela is a narrative. You already know what we think about Venezuela and the Venezuelan government,” said Uruguayan President Lacalle Pou during a speech at the summit.
Along the same lines, the Chilean leader, Gabriel Boric, stated: “I express, respectfully, that I have a discrepancy with what President Lula said, in the sense that the situation of human rights in Venezuela was a narrative construction, it is not a narrative construction, it is a reality, it is serious and I had the opportunity to see, I saw the horror of the Venezuelans. This issue requires a firm position.”
Asked about the differences
cias during a press conference after the summit, Lula highlighted the plurality of the meeting. “The fact that the citizen has the right to speak ill and to disagree, that’s all I care about,” he replied.
“Maduro is part of this continent of ours. There was a lot of respect with Maduro’s participation. No one is obliged to agree with anyone. This is how we are doing it,” added the president.
He also made a speech in defense of respect for the sovereignty of countries and criticized what he classified as the different weights given to regimes considered authoritarian. “I have always defended the idea that each country is sovereign to decide the political model, internal things. The same demand that the world makes of Venezuela, it does not make of Saudi Arabia. It is very strange. I want Venezuela to be respected. I want this for Brazil and the whole world,” continued Lula.
Sul-American hole
Earlier, in a speech, Lula defended the resumption of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR). Created in 2008, in President Lula’s second term, and amid the rise of center-left governments, the group came to bring together all the countries in the region, but it disintegrated over time, after changes in governments in several countries, and now brings together only seven: Venezuela, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname and Peru, in addition to Argentina and Brazil, which recently returned to the group.
The resumption of Unsaul, however, is not a consensus among leaders in the region. “We have to stop this trend: the creation of organizations. Let’s base ourselves on actions,” stated Uruguayan Lacalle Pou, in a speech at the summit.
“When it was up to us to take over the government, we withdrew from Unasur. Then they invited us to Prosul [bloco criado em 2019 em contraponto à Unasul], and we said no. Because otherwise we end up being ideological clubs that have life and continuity only as long as we march with our ideologies,” added the president of the neighboring country.
Brasilia Consensus
At the end of this Tuesday’s meeting, the 11 presidents present, plus the representative of the government of Peru, released a letter in which they reaffirm common values and agree to deepen discussions on the creation or reestablishment of some cooperation mechanism that involves all countries in the region. [. Entre os itens aprovados, está a elaboração de uma proposta para se criar um organismo sul-americano de cooperação. Segundo Lula, o grupo de ministros de Relações Exteriores devem apresentar uma proposta em cerca de quatro meses. “Esse grupo que foi criado, de chanceleres, tem 120 dias para apresentar, numa próxima reunião [de presidentes]the proposals they intend to complete,” he said in a statement to journalists.
“Today’s meeting is an example that either we decide to get together to fight in defense of our interests or we become puppets in the hands of the big economies”, emphasized Lula, once again defending the resumption of a group of countries in the region.
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