Aggression has increasingly become a key input into politics. Leaders find the mobilization of hostile sentiments a highly profitable way to build consensus in polarized societies. This domestic strategy often becomes internationalized. Insults and insults cross borders and threaten to cause crises between states.
In Mercosur, the bloc formed by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, this trend is deepening. Its starting point is a conflict between Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Javier Milei. But as the months go by, it is beginning to have an impact on institutional relations. The latest news is that the Argentine president, in an unprecedented decision, decided not to attend the meeting of heads of state that this association of countries will hold next Monday 8 in Asunción. Milei will be represented by his foreign minister, Diana Mondino.
Lula is not the only president Milei will avoid. He will not meet with Bolivian Luis Arce, with whom he is also at odds. Bolivia participates in these meetings as a candidate to join Mercosur. When the military movements led by General Juan José Zúñiga, who was advancing towards La Paz, became known last Wednesday, the Argentine Foreign Ministry immediately issued a condemnation. It also signed the Mercosur statement condemning this uprising and demanding the maintenance of democracy in Bolivia. But last Sunday, the Office of the President of Argentina published a statement denouncing that what happened in Bolivia was a false coup, orchestrated by Arce. The unexpected: Evo Morales, Arce’s adversary within the Movement for Socialism, also expressed the same interpretation.Fought He lied to Bolivians and he lied to the world,” Morales said.
The Bolivian president demanded an apology from Milei. And he received the support of Lula, who will travel to La Paz next week to express his support there. Another divergence between Lula and Milei.
The summit in Asunción offered the first opportunity for Lula and Milei to shake hands. They breathed the same air at Borgo Egnazia, the luxurious resort where Giorgia Meloni received the participants of the G7 meeting in the middle of last month. However, the two presidents set a very strict strategy to avoid being face to face during the entire meeting. Milei attended that meeting on the emphatic advice of several collaborators because, despite accepting the invitation, at the last minute he had decided not to attend.
Milei and Lula’s enmity has its roots in the Argentine’s electoral campaign last year. Who threw the first stone? In February 2023, Lula visited Joe Biden in Washington and warned him, without naming names, that, depending on the outcome of those elections, democracy could be in danger in Argentina. The previous month, in Brasilia, an opposition demonstration, identified with Jair Bolsonaro, had invaded the headquarters of the three branches of the State, obeying a coup impulse similar to that which, in Washington, led a crowd sympathetic to Donald Trump to take over the Capitol.
In this context, Lula pointed out to Biden, without a doubt, the nightmare that a victory for Milei would be, whom he associates with Bolsonaro. It is a justified association. Milei established a very close relationship with Bolsonaro and, above all, with his son Eduardo, whom he visited on numerous occasions in Brazil.
The Argentine far-right candidate returned the criticism in a more hurtful way. In an interview with Jaime Baily, he said that Lula was “corrupt” and also a “communist,” which is perhaps more serious for him.
It is clear that Lula was convinced that there was a threat to Argentine democracy under Milei. Reinforcements arrived from Brazil for Sergio Massa, the candidate to succeed Alberto Fernández, who proposed the continuation of Kirchnerism in power. The political marketing team that advised Massa was made up of experts who had already worked for Lula.
The Brazilian and Argentine foreign ministries deployed all their flexibility to keep the bilateral relationship safe from personal hatred. The first thing to be suspended were the presidential statements. Milei showed that, when he wants, he can moderate himself, at the G7 meeting. His press office, which is hyperactive in disseminating all his statements, this time refrained from disclosing the words he pronounced before his colleagues. It is known that they were very moderate. Perhaps it was not out of consideration for Lula. Also sitting at the table were Pope Francis, Biden and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who would not be very pleased to hear that “social justice is a crime” and “socialism is a cancer that has killed millions of people,” as the Argentine usually preaches.
The hard-working good neighborliness could not bear a conflict. 143 prisoners fled from Brazil, accused of participating in the coup attempt on January 8. 86 entered Argentina, requesting political asylum. Manuel Adorni, Milei’s spokesman, declared that the government’s conduct will be as the law dictates. In Brasilia they expect more: that the request for refuge be rejected and that they be extradited.
Against this backdrop of tension and on the eve of the Mercosur meeting, Lula broke the rule of not referring to his colleague. He said he expected an apology from Milei for the “nonsense” he had said about him. Spokesman Adorni said that this would not happen. And the presidential headquarters let it be known that the president would not be in Asunción. As of last night, the Argentine embassy in Asunción had requested a car rental.
To make the snub even more noticeable, Mieli confirmed his participation in a summit of right-wing forces, led by Bolsonarists, in Brazil. That is, he will go to the neighboring country to do internal politics, as he also did in Spain, joining the Vox campaign. No one has the right to complain. Lula visited Buenos Aires many times to speak at Kirchnerist events. And Sánchez recorded commercials in favor of Massa, Milei’s rival. The links between States are blurred so that the links between factions predominate.
The construction of Mercosur and, in general, international relations in the region, have been built around what is known as presidential diplomacy. Direct dealings between heads of state who agree on policies or resolve problems. This dimension of foreign relations plays against the harmony between Argentina and Brazil. But the divergence does not end there.
The Lula and Milei administrations have opposing positions on important issues that extend beyond their borders. In the face of Russia’s war against Ukraine, Brazil has maintained preferential treatment with Vladimir Putin’s government. And Milei is a hyperactive ally of Volodymyr Zelensky. To such an extent that Argentina joined the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, a NATO platform for planning actions in favor of that country.
These similarities and rejections were clearly expressed at the beginning of this year. Argentina, under Alberto Fernández, had accepted the invitation to join the BRICS group, led by China and made up of Russia and Brazil. Milei announced that he would review this decision and would not join the club. Other differences are yet to come: for example, it is unlikely that Argentines and Brazilians will adopt the same position on trade when discussing relations with other blocs, such as the Mercosur agreement with the European Union.
In the face of the war in Gaza, the contradiction is perhaps even more acute. Milei strongly supports Israeli policy. Lula accused Benjamin Netanyahu of giving the Palestinians a treatment similar to that received by the Jews from the Nazis. Israel declared it persona non grata.
The more general definitions of both governments are also at odds. For example: Karina Milei, the powerful sister of the Argentine president
, appointed a kind of foreign ministry intervenor, the lawyer Ursula Basset, to review with reactionary criteria the positions of that agency on gender policies, the environment and human rights. Three issues on which Lula adopts a progressive perspective, perhaps more radical than the one he himself embraced in his previous administrations.
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