CELSO AMORIM AND BRAZIL'S BURIAL OF DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES IN LATIN AMERICA - June 19, 2009

The article appeared originally in Poder magazine in Spanish and is being translated into English with the permission of the author.

Latin American literature is abundant in stories and poems about those persons whose job is to bury people. From the writings of the Colombian poet Julio Flórez, who died early in the century, to the people who belong to the world of fantasy. But there are other types too – that belong to the real world of politics, as is the case of Celso Amorim, the Foreign Minister of the Federal Republic of Brazil.

But why include Amorim in this category? Because, unlike the poets who write about how they buried their own love and passions, the Foreign Minister of Brazil works hard to bury the core principles and values that affect millions of people in Latin America. His first shovelful was thrown at the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago, where he said that "the absence of Cuba in the OAS is an anomaly that needs to be corrected." It was – without a doubt – an invitation to bury the Inter-American Democratic Charter’s Articles 3 and 7, as well as the American Convention on Human Rights, which sets minimum standards for democratic governance that are part of the inter-American system. As a matter of fact, for the past 50 years Cuba has represented precisely the opposite to that Convention.

Was Cuba’s exclusion really an anomaly? Some of the officials, including the Secretary General of the OAS, believe that it was and that it was unjustified, despite the fact that Cuba tried to export its communist ideology in the 60’s through crude violence. It is despicable, but perhaps understandable, that the Venezuelan President has subordinated to Havana the conduct of the national and foreign policy of Venezuela. He seems to forget that Venezuela was assaulted by Cuba that was and still is committed to the destruction of thedemocratic institutions in Venezuela in order to implant a communist regime.

But Celso Amorim, not satisfied with his attempt to bury agreements which all countries should respect, isactively promoting the entry of Venezuela to Mercosur, an act that would effectively bury the Ushuaia Protocol, which requires the existence of real democratic institutions as an essential condition for the membership in Mercosur. It is well known that the Venezuelan regime has a dense and rapidly accumulating record before the international judicial institutions of its human rights violations and abuses of freedom and dignity of its own people. Those violations should prevent the Venezuelan regime from meeting the democratic standards required by those agreements.As a matter of fact, the Venezuelan head of state, Hugo Chavez is second to none in the chapter of human rights violations in the region.

But what could motivate Brazil’s actions – a country of such importance, which knows perfectly well that Venezuela is under the control of an authoritarian and militarized regime that restricts democracy and individual freedoms of its people?

The answer is very simple. The policy of the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva toward Venezuela is based primarily on business opportunities that have been increasingly available to Brazil under the express instructions of Hugo Chavez. Large Brazilian construction companies are getting extremely lucrative business deals without public bidding.

It seems that Lula, who himself was the victim of military governments in his own country, forgets that the defense of human rights and democracy should constitute a central aspect of his international agenda. After all, Brazil aspires to become a permanent member of the United Nations’ Security Council – the world’s highest political entity – and should be mindful not to be remembered as responsible for the burial of the democratic agreements of Latin America.

Diego Arria

Diego Arria is a distinguished diplomat, who served as Venezuela’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations in the 90’s, and as the President of the Security Council (1992-1993). Prior to that, he served as the Governor of Caracas and the Minister of Information and Tourism. Mr. Arria is currently involved in supporting and organizing opposition movements challenging the regime of Hugo Chavez.