He President of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silvahe discarded sharply the possibility of negotiating with his American pair, Donald Trumpafter The imposition of 50% tariffs on Brazilian productsconsidering that any dialogue in this context would represent a “humiliation” for your country.
In statements to Reuters from the presidential residence in Brasilia, Lula was overwhelming: “The day my intuition tells me that Trump is ready to speak, I will not hesitate to call it. But today my intuition says he doesn’t want to speak. And I’m not going to humiliate. “
Diplomatic crisis by Bolsonaro case
Although the US set a 10% reciprocal tariff for Brazil, Trump added 40% extra product of the alleged “witch hunt” against former president Jair Bolsonaro, who faces a trial for conspiring to reverse the electoral results of 2022.
Lula described the United States-Brazil relations at its lowest point in two centuries And it was very hard with his predecessor: “Bolsonaro should face another trial for provoking Trump’s intervention. Is a traitor to the country“The president said.
In addition, the Brazilian president flatly rejected any external interference in the judicial system of his country. “The Supreme Court of Brazil, which is seeing the case against Bolsonaro, does not care what Trump says and should not matter“He emphasized.
Joint action with the BRICS
Despite the commercial pressure, the president explained that Brazil will not announce reciprocal tariffs immediately. Instead, Lula said will contact the leaders of the BRICS countries, starting with India and Chinato evaluate a joint response.
“There is still no coordination between the BRICS, But there will be“The exsindicalist anticipated, comparing multilateral action with the power of collective bargaining.”What is the negotiation power of a small country with the United States? None”.
In parallel, Brazil analyzes the possibility of submitting a collective complaint before the World Trade Organization (WTO) along with other affected countries.
No trouble to negotiate
Tough To face some of the tariffshis higher taxes by the Trump administrationthe weight of the Brazilian economy, The world’s largest ninthgives Lula a greater margin of maneuver than other leaders to resist US pressure. “I was born negotiating,” recalled the referent of the Workers Party (PT). However, he stressed that he has no trouble to close an agreement: “We need to be very cautious.”
Lula said that Trump could meet at the UN General Assembly next month or in the November climatic conversations, but criticized the treatment that the US president gave him other leaders such as the Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelensky and the South African Cyril Ramaphosa.
“What Trump did with Zelensky was a humiliation. That is not normal. What he did with Ramaphosa was humiliation,” he questioned. “A president cannot be humilling another. I respect everyone and demand respect.”
Source: Ambito
