On his biweekly radio program, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said today that Brazil will not desist from playing its role in the South America integration process.
He added that he considers the current moment very promising, especially with the creation of the South American Community of Nations.
“As the largest economy, with the largest population, as the country with the highest scientific and technological potential, we have the obligation to ensure the right conditions so that this growth won’t be only internal to Brazil, but that it will also happen in other countries, especially those that have common border with us,” said Lula in the program “Café com o Presidente” (Breakfast with the President).
He recalled the need to expand the development of South American countries as a way to combat drug trafficking and organized crime.
At the end of March, in an official trip to Ciudad Guayana, in Venezuela, Lula proposed a joint effort between Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela, and affirmed that drug trafficking and terrorism are “everybody’s business.”
The President said that at the same time that the government has been working to make the economy grow and generate more jobs, Brazil is also working towards generating opportunities for other countries in South America.
“Thus, we will have a much stronger commercial relationship, and will depend less on the two current dominant blocs in the world, the European Union (EU) and the United States (US).”
Brazilian foreign policies’ victories in the World Trade Organization (WTO) were also mentioned in the program.
“We won the sugarcane dispute against the EU. We won the cotton dispute against the US. And we won the salted poultry case against the EU, which did not consider it meat,” he added.
Last week the WTO confirmed the Appellate Body decision that suggests the EU to reduce its subsidized exports to a limit of 1,273,500 tons of sugar per year.
Agência Brasil
