Radical leftist President of Brazil Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is allegedly attempting to push through a joint statement at this week’s G20 summit that lacks explicit condemnation of Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and condemns Israel, the Argentine outlet Infobae reported on Monday.
Heads of state and representatives of the G20 nations are gathering in Rio de Janeiro for the group’s 19th summit. The two-day event, which began on Monday, marks the first time Brazil has served as host.
According to Infobae, Lula is “negotiating against the clock” with G7 member nations participating in the G20 summit, and submitted a consensus initiative to G7 Sherpas (emissaries) that presents a soft stance on Russia but boasts a “more equidistant position with respect to Israel,” calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and Lebanon.
The Brazilian president, much like other leftist heads of state in the region, has been at the forefront of a widespread international campaign against Israel since the start of the country’s self-defense operations against Hamas and Hezbollah following Hamas’ unprecedented October 7, 2023, terrorist attack in Israel.
Lula has repeatedly accused Israel of committing a “genocide” with its self-defense operations and has compared Israel’s actions in Gaza to those of Nazi Germany and Adolf Hitler during the Holocaust. The Brazilian president’s actions and continued condemnation of Israel single-handedly damaged the decades-long historic relations between both nations.
Infobae explained that G20 summit host nations “have more power than on their own as a state,” asserting that Brazil is taking advantage of the fact to promote a draft final statement that would benefit Russia, Turkey, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and Iran. Such a statement would also reportedly oppose the interests of the United States, Israel, Ukraine, the European G7 countries, and Argentina, whose President Javier Milei will reportedly oppose some other proposals that Lula intends to elevate at the summit regarding gender and climate change.
The answer to Lula’s draft consensus initiative, official G7 spokesmen assured Infobae, will arrive midday (local time) in Rio de Janeiro.
Infobae’s report follows reports by Brazilian outlets indicating that Lula’s Brazil is reluctant to reopen the text of the G20 declaration over the war in Ukraine. Unnamed Brazilian government sources told the newspaper O Globo that the text of the declaration remains “closed” and that Lula himself is not going “to reopen the debate,” despite intense demands from European nations following Russia’s attack Sunday on Ukrainian power plants.
“If the document survives the whole night, we will arrive at the summit with a better chance of it being approved,” one of the sources told O Globo.
In the Brazilian government’s view, the sources explained, “reopening [debate on] a document that was closed with great difficulty, after days of difficult negotiations, would imply taking a very high risk that the summit would end without a presidential declaration.”
The sources asserted that the corresponding negotiations have allegedly entered a “take it or leave it” phase, stressing that said pressure could favor consensus as it is “difficult for a country to maintain an isolated position and oppose all the others when it comes to the last moment.”
Lula, in remarks given to O Globo on Sunday, claimed that G20’s final declaration should include a recommendation to “end the war in Gaza, Lebanon, and Ukraine,” and justified his apparent reluctance to bring the “issue of war” to the G20 in order to “give space to the poor.”
“I think we will make a recommendation that we want peace in the Gaza Strip, in Lebanon and in Ukraine. We want to end all wars,” Lula said.
The Brazilian president claimed that he made a point of avoiding debates about said conflicts at the leaders’ meeting because, according to him, “we would not discuss other important things for those who are not at war, such as the invisible people of the world, who people often do not see.”
According to O Globo, climate change, gender, and the taxation of the “super-rich” are other topics currently dragging down the final draft resolution.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
