MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Latinamerica and Mercosur, priorities of Brazil foreign policy ratifies Rousseff

President Dilma Rousseff

President Dilma Rousseff ratified Latinamerica and Mercosur as Brazil’s foreign policy priorities, but at the same time emphasizing the ‘excellent relations’ with the United States and the European Union.

At the graduation ceremony of thirty new diplomats on Monday President Rousseff made a quick review of the country’s foreign policy and underlined all the initiatives in which Brazil has been active partner in recent years “to strengthen Mercosur”, the customs group of which it is a founding member next to Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay currently suspended, plus Venezuela which joined a year ago.

Rousseff also mentioned the construction of that “fundamental mechanism of regional integration and affirmation which is the Union of South American Nations, Unaur which since its conception has proved to be a balanced, democratic and stabilizing force” for the region.

“The world scenario demands from South America a strong united reply to those challenges” and at the same time a deepening of “economic and trade integration, political dialogue and defence” so that “we can resolve the problems with no foreign intervention”.

The Brazilian president also described the brain-child of deceased Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, the Community of Latinamerican and Caribbean states, Celac “as an unprecedented event in regional history”.

Rousseff also praised Brazil’s policy to establish close links with African countries that have “an enormous relevance in the history and formation of Brazil” a nation that holds almost 100 million Afro-descendents.

“Because of these historic links for Brazil it is an obligation to contribute to the development of Africa and to extend to African countries the social technologies of inclusion, which in Brazil have helped millions to climb into the middle class and even more millions to leave behind extreme poverty”, said the Brazilian president.

Likewise has been the decision to have close relations in the South/South axis with such groups as BRICS which brings together Russia, India, China and South Africa, the other group of leading emerging economies.

“This strategic decision has helped Brazil reinforce its international presence and collaborated in ensuring that Brazilian personalities currently hold posts of global relevance”, said Rousseff, among which she mentioned Jose Graziano as head of FAO and Roberto Azevedo, as director general of the World Trade Organization.

However all these initiatives have not distanced Brazil from developed countries said the Brazilian president emphasizing that the country has “extremely qualified relations with the EU and the United States”.

“These relations with the richest countries in the world don’t impede Brazil from having its own personality and character in the international stage, and insisting that multilateralism is the only possible instrument of resolving conflicts” and building the right equation of ‘peace, security and social justice, demanded by the majority of the planet’.

Finally Rousseff reiterated the demand for an ‘urgent’ reform of the UN Security Council where Brazil aspires to hold a permanent seat, and of the multilateral financial institutions so that “they reflect the current world reality” and not that from “the end of World War II (1945)”.