“We are trying to build a group of countries that have no involvement with the war, that don’t want the war, that want to build peace in the world so that we can talk both with Russia and with Ukraine,” said President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva last Sunday.
The statement was given in Abu Dhabi, on the way back from a trip to China during which bilateral trade and investments were a priority — and Ukraine sat on the back burner. Lula and China’s Xi Jinping only briefly mentioned the conflict, saying both countries supported each other’s initiatives to restore world peace.
Lula’s initial idea was more daring: to lead mediation between Russia and Ukraine and help the entire world by unclogging grains and energy trade that has been hampered since Russian troops invaded Ukraine. The move would make Brazil a bonafide heavyweight in international affairs.
It would also serve as vengeance for Lula’s failed attempt at brokering a nuclear deal with Iran during his second term as president. Brazil and Turkey negotiated with Tehran back in 2010, but the terms Iran agreed upon were snubbed by Western powers. The administration of former U.S. President Barack Obama would eventually reach an Iran deal of its own in 2016.
Despite being considered by the Lula camp as one of his greatest foreign policy achievements, many observers see the deal in less of a good light. In 2011, Al Akhawayn University international relations professor Nizar Messari said in an event organized by the Wilson Center that the “Brazil-Turkey mediation let Iran ‘off the hook’ and would have allowed it to both continue its nuclear development while retaining membership in the international community.”
“The country is doing well to propose dialogue, even if it may be clumsy in doing so at times,” says Paulo Abrão, director of the think tank Washington Brazil Office. Still, analysts...
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