2023-08-21 20:42:00
From Buenos Aires to Caracas, passing through Brasilia, concern grows like wildfire. It has been doing so since Sunday the 13th, when Javier Miley He became the unexpected winner of the primaries, and positioned himself in a serious and concrete way for the presidential elections in October.
The President of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silvashares for these hours with his Argentine counterpart Alberto Fernandez and the Venezuelan Nicolas Maduroamong others, doubts about the future of the regional integration plan, which the libertarian leader promises to break into pieces if he reaches the Casa Rosada in December.
He Mercosurwhich Milei said she will seek to eliminate, the Unasur and the celac, make up the triad of regional organizations that the Brazilian – as endorsement of leaders such as Argentina and Venezuela – is using to reinforce his leadership, a strategy that also includes his role in the Brics and the G20. A government like Milei’s, they repeat almost in the same way in the three South American capitals, would jeopardize the agreements already reached and would destroy the harmony which, it should be clarified, is not unanimous throughout the region, with different visions that coexist in these international forums.
“The integration scheme has been hit, and in Brazil there is a lot of concern about the future of Mercosur, in politics and business,” they told THE NATION from the Argentine embassy in Brasilia, headed by Daniel Scioli. The same concern faces Maduro, who, hand in hand with Lula, has begun his return to international forums such as Unasur, despite the denunciations and harsh criticism of his human rights and civil liberties policy that the Chavista regime still receives, from the United States. United States and also from countries with progressive governments, such as Chile de Gabriel Boric.
as far as he could tell THE NATION, Maduro also tried to meetthrough close collaborators from the Argentine embassy in Venezuela headed by Oscar LabordeWhat are the real chances of success for a leader who called him a “dictator” and “drug trafficker” and whom he himself called an “extreme right-wing neo-Nazi and fascist” at a meeting of the Sao Paulo forum in November of last year? . As he prepares for next year’s elections and denies the opposition’s accusations, Maduro has intensified his relationship with Lula and also with Argentinathrough a greater and discreet commercial flow in recent months.
Presidents Alberto Fernández and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, during the last Mercosur meeting, in Puerto Iguazú (Photo by NELSON ALMEIDA / AFP)NELSON ALMEIDA – Télam
Without denying the possible risks of Milei’s rise, which according to THE NATION were the subject of conversation of Fernández, Lula da Silva and other presidents of the continent during the assumption of santiago pena As the new president of Paraguay, from the Foreign Ministry they put cold cloths and assure, at least from the public discourse, that the regional integration process is still on.
“There is a political show unfolding and a new political agenda has been imposed, or not so new, because (Mauritius) Macri had already insisted, along with (Sebastian) Pinera, to set aside Unasur and created ProSur. But Milei did not win the general election and there is still a long way to go before she does,” he added. Gabriel Fuchsbrand new Undersecretary for Latin America of the Foreign Ministry.
This week, and in addition to rejecting trade with China on the grounds that it “does not agree with communists”, Milei was refractory to a rapprochement with Lula, whom he called a “left-handed defender of dictatorships”, and promised to leave Mercosur, which he described as a “defective customs union.”
“It is difficult for Milei to effectively break Mercosur, because even in the moments of greatest tension it never broke”, adds Fuks, implicitly referring to the criticism of the former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro to the regional bloc and the threats from the president of Uruguay, Luis Lacalle Pou, to get rid of the “ballast” that the current Mercosur means for him, and accelerate bilateral trade agreements such as China and countries in Oceania. With Bolivia in the process of joining Mercosur, “integration is growing and not going backwards,” Fuks counterattacked, although friction in that trade bloc remains latent. In fact, he himself heard Paraguay’s claim on Thursday, through the Chargé d’Affaires, Juan Ramon Cano Montañadue to the increase in the price of tolls paid by ships that cross the Paraná-Paraguay Waterway.
If Mercosur still shows signs of validity despite internal difficulties and friction, the future of Unasur and Celac is even more difficult after the Milei wave was unleashed. As president of Celac, Alberto Fernández promoted negotiations with the European Union and the indirect participation of the United States in the Brussels summit, although to keep the bloc together he had to satisfy the demands of Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, which historically managed the organization founded by the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
Argentina works with Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, current president of the community of states, and Honduras, whose president Xiomara Castro (close to Vice President Cristina Kirchner) will take over next year. “If Milei wins, things will change, because you can’t go to a forum like that and insult other members,” they recall from the Foreign Ministry. In the case of Unasur, Lula da Silva also worked so that the 12 South American countries were present at the summit on May 31 (including Venezuela) and an irruption by Milei would break that basic consensus, the sources agree.
Already determined not to travel next week to the Brics summit in Johannesburg -the incorporation of Argentina into that powerful trade bloc will not be discussed there-, and with less than four months remaining in his term, the President supports the regional efforts of Lula, with whom he continues to have a strong personal relationship, although the project of a Great Homeland faces multiple additional challenges. One of them was and is that of the elections in Ecuador, this Sunday, in which the candidate of Rafael Correa, Luisa Gonzalezwas the most voted but was affected after the murder of one of its competitors, Fernando Villavicencio. The growth of Jan Topicthe “Ecuadorian Rambo” who averaged fifteen points yesterday, threatens to generate a political earthquake in that country in the medium term, similar to Milei’s.
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