“They want to colonize us” – Brazilian President Lula warns of foreign interference”
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has issued a scathing attack on foreign influence at the 10th summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in Bogota, Colombia. Without directly mentioning US President Donald Trump, he condemned recent actions such as the kidnapping of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and the fuel embargo on Cuba, saying a colonialist approach to developing countries was emerging. “No one can think that other countries belong to them,” Lula said, accusing the powers that once plundered gold, silver and diamonds of their own countries of now seeking to seize rare earths.
The Brazilian President also commented on the current US-Israeli and Iranian conflict, comparing it to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He pointed out that Iraq was invaded on the grounds that it had chemical weapons, but none were found in the end, and that today’s invasion of Iran was based on the assumption that it was developing nuclear bombs. Although American interventions in Latin America have a history of about 200 years, they have intensified again under the Trump administration, he stressed, and that actions such as imposing a 50% tax on Brazilian goods and taking the Venezuelan leader to New York violate the sovereignty of countries.
Lula also said that the United Nations (UN), which has failed to stop the conflicts in Gaza, Ukraine and Iran, has completely failed, and again proposed that its Security Council should be reformed immediately. Colombian President Gustavo Petro also endorsed this idea, saying that the organization established to prevent world wars has become powerless today. This statement by Lula, who is preparing to run in the next presidential election in Brazil, has further strengthened anti-American leftist ideology in the South American region.
