President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s participation in a summit of Latin American leaders, less than a month after taking office, marked Brazil’s efforts to resume a leading role in the region.
(Bloomberg) — President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s participation in a summit of Latin American leaders, less than a month after taking office, marked Brazil’s efforts to resume a leading role in the region.
“It is with great joy and very special satisfaction that Brazil is back in the region and ready to work side by side with all of you, with a very strong sense of solidarity and closeness,” Lula said Tuesday at a summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States.
The group of 33 nations known as CELAC was founded in 2010 to replace the Organization of American States and counter US influence in the region. Brazil left CELAC in 2020 under former President Jair Bolsonaro, who had political and ideological differences with Cuba and Venezuela.
The country’s return to the organization under Lula three years later was celebrated in a joint statement at the end of the meeting. The document reaffirmed the group’s commitment to democracy and demanded that regional banks as well as multilateral development organizations improve access to credit for countries that emerged from Covid with higher levels of public debt.
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Ideological Tensions
The summit also served as a forum for member nations to strengthen diplomatic and trade ties across the region.
“We have adopted a very good, comprehensive and thorough declaration on a wide range of challenges facing us,” said Ralph Gonsalves, Prime Minister of the tiny Caribbean island nation of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, which was elected to assume the CELAC pro-tempore presidency role in 2023.
Still, ideological differences remained a source of tension in the region, with Uruguay’s President Luis Lacalle Pou criticizing CELAC members that do not respect democracy and human rights and warning that the organization risks becoming a “club of ideological friends.”
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Uruguay has been clashing with its partners at the Mercosur trade bloc as it seeks to move forward with bilateral trade talks with China.
“We are in a position to negotiate bilaterally with China,” Lacalle Pou said at the CELAC summit. “If it’s with Mercosur, even better.”
Celso Amorim, a special adviser to Lula, said Brazil respects Uruguay’s demands but wants to preserve Mercosur.
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