NC | The invasion of the capital has also, however briefly, united almost all of the governments of Latin America against right-wing authoritarianism. Just about every head of state in the region, with the notable exception, I believe, of El Salvador’s Nayib Bukele and Guatemala’s Alejandro Giammattei, has expressed support for Lula’s government and condemnation of the events of Sunday, Jan 8. They include the heads of state of Uruguay, Ecuador, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic. Again, this would have been unthinkable just a few days ago.
The reason why this is important is that one of the key foreign policy goals of Lula’s new government is to open a new chapter of regional cooperation and integration in Latin America — something that has been tried many times before and largely failed.
One of Lula’s first actions since taking office was to confirm the return of Brazil to CELAC (the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States), an intergovernmental mechanism for dialogue and political agreements. It was set up in Caracas in 2011 with the implicit goal of deepening Latin American integration and reducing the influence of the United States on the politics and economics of Latin America. Lula will officially ratify his decision to rejoin at CELAC’s seventh summit, to be held in Buenos Aires on Jan 24.
As readers may recall, Mexico’s President Andrés Manuel Lopéz Obrador (aka AMLO) proposed using CELAC as a vehicle to create in Latin America something similar to the European Economic Community, the six-member economic association formed in 1957 that would eventually evolve into today’s 27-member European Union. But he also emphasised “the need to respect national sovereignty and adhere to non-interventionist and pro-development policies” as well as ensure that any resulting structure is “in accordance with our history, our reality, and our identities.”
In his speech at the sixth CELAC summit, held in September 2021, AMLO reiterated his hopes that CELAC would eventually supplant the widely reviled Washington-based Organization of American States (OAS) as the main institution for intra-regional relations. He also invited Mexico’s North American trade partners, the US and Canada, to join. Both are already observer states, as too is China.
However, as I noted at the time, it’s virtually impossible to even imagine senior representatives of the US and Canadian governments sitting around a table with leaders of countries such as Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, let alone debating regional policy with them. Lest we forget, just last summer the Biden Administration scored a major diplomatic own goal by refusing to invite the same three countries to the 9th Summit of the Americas, in Los Angeles, which resulted in a number of other heads of state refusing to attend.
Now, the Biden administration will have to contend with the diplomatic blowback from the arrival of Bolsonaro and his lackey Torres in Florida just days before Sunday’s insurrection. A number of members of the progressive caucus, including AOC, have already called for Bolsonaro not be allowed refuge on US soil.
This places the Biden administration in a bit of a bind, since the US has always served as a refuge for US-aligned heads of state and coup plotters in Latin America. Plus, lest we forget, the US Justice Department had an important hand in the now-disgraced Operation Car Wash in Brazil, which led to the downfall of Dilma Rousseff’s government, the imprisonment of Lula just as he was preparing to run for office again, and the eventual election of Bolsonaro.
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