‘I Won’t Quarrel with Chavez, He’s My Friend,’ Says Brazil’s Lula

Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva admitted Friday, July 6, the existence of problems between BrasÀ­lia and Caracas, although he downplayed the tone of the dispute with his Venezuelan counterpart Hugo Chavez, whom he called my "friend."

"Nobody can make me quarrel with President Chavez who is my friend," said the Brazilian president during an interview with the French television channel France 24.

Lula statements come in the midst of a dispute with Venezuela over her incorporation request to Mercosur and following Chavez warnings about a withdrawal if the Brazilian congress does not approve it.

"We have similar problems to the European Union," admitted Lula who insisted that "there's no crisis".

However the Brazilian president pointed out that Venezuela still is not a member of the block, therefore it cannot abandon it and recalled that the Congress which allegedly is "offensive" to Chavez is the same one that came to his defense when there was a coup to oust him.

"It's one of those contradictions of politics with which one must learn to live, otherwise we would be fighting all the time".

This week Argentine president Nestor Kirchner revealed he had approached his Brazilian counterpart to try and accelerate the approval by the Brazilian Congress of Venezuela's Mercosur incorporation protocol.

The incident began when the Brazilian Congress in an open letter asked Chavez to reconsider his decision not to renew Venezuela's main and longest established television station RCTV. Chavez reacted calling Brazilian Senators "parrots of Washington" adding he would only wait until September to have Venezuela's Mercosur incorporation protocol approved.

From Lisbon Lula said that if Chavez does not want to stay, let him not stay, "to become a member of Mercosur there are rules, but none to leave".

Mercopress

Tags:

You May Also Like

Bolivia’s Evo Morales Win Brings the Bears in Brazil

Latin American stocks including those from Brazil dropped as the election of a socialist ...

Brazil Offers US$ 86 Million for Research

Yesterday, Brazil’s Minister of Science and Technology, Eduardo Campos, issued 20 directives announcing the ...

Death Penalty: UN Backs Brazil and 9 Others’ Call for Executions Moratorium

Today the UN General Assembly endorsed the call for a worldwide moratorium on executions ...

Brazil Has US$ 42 Million for Those Willing to Plant Castor Beans

The National Program to Strengthen Family Farming (Pronaf) will offer a line of credit ...

End of European Embargo Gives Brazil Honey Exports a Boost

Honey exports from Brazil have bounced back from the falling figures observed in July ...

Brazil’s Rousseff Announces US$ 14 Bi to Build 208 Professional Education Schools by 2014

In Brazil, this past weekend, the new National High School Exam (Exame Nacional do ...

Time for a Gentler Economic Policy in Brazil

Brazilian Economist Walter Brasil Mundell believes that the Brazilian economy will grow more in ...

Brazil’s International Organic Fair Exceeds Expectations

The BioFach América Latina 2004, the continent’s biggest organic product fair, ended on Friday ...

Brazil Uses IMF Clause to Fix Its Ports

Brazil’s Ministry of Transportation will invest US$ 157.1 million (427 million reais) this year ...

Brazil Launches Plan to Boost Biofuel Production

The National Agro-energy Plan was launched Friday, October 14, by Brazil’s Minister of Agriculture, ...