Ukraine, an uncomfortable war for Brazil and Argentina

Bolsonaro's Brazil and Fernández's Argentina have been trying to remain neutral since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24.

Only eight days had passed after the Brazilian president was received in Moscow by Vladimir Putin and twenty since a similar visit by the Argentine.

Both Latin American presidents then highlighted the good relations they maintain with the Kremlin.

But the war has turned everything upside down.

The diplomatic tension leaves little room for the grays, and both Bolsonaro and Fernández, located at the ideological poles, face domestic problems due to their international positioning.

Bolsonaro, who moves with enormous clumsiness in international affairs, insisted on Sunday with the idea of ​​neutrality.

“Brazil's vote is not defined and is not linked to any power.

Our vote is free.

Our position is one of balance”, he declared, after mocking that the Ukrainians put in the last elections “in the hands of a comedian the destiny of a nation”.

The president referred to the European war during an appearance in the middle of his beach vacation for the Carnival.

President Volodímir Zelenski is a former actor and businessman who won the elections with an anti-corruption and anti-political speech, precisely the axes of the Brazilian's campaign.

Brazil has criticized the Russian military intervention and called for an immediate cessation of hostilities but without expressly condemning the invasion of Ukraine.

This Tuesday at the UN he criticized the supply of weapons to Kiev and the sanctions against Moscow, and calls for a negotiated solution.

His toughest statement was voting in the Security Council on Friday in favor of a resolution that from the beginning was bound to fail because Russia exercised its veto right.

The next day, Brazil avoided joining the OAS in a declaration of condemnation, so that it was aligned with Argentina, Bolivia and Putin's closest allies in the region: Nicaragua and Cuba.

Brazilian diplomacy has historically maintained a position of neutrality in international forums, even during the Cold War.

Bolsonaro's decision to maintain his official visit to Moscow at all costs when the drums of war were already intense annoyed the United States, which wanted to avoid the trip and once consummated expressed its anger publicly.

Every time Bolsonaro talks about Ukraine he appeals to the supply of fertilizers.

Russia is, with its ally Belarus, the first supplier of this crucial good for the Brazilian agricultural sector, whose importation was already suffering complications due to sanctions imposed on both countries before the current conflict broke out.

Argentina's situation is also that of an ally with Russia, although the war has introduced nuances.

The Government of Alberto Fernández was the first to approve the use of the Sputnik V vaccine against the coronavirus, a key step for the arrival of the Russian vial in Latin America.

But the good relations go back a long way, from the times of the government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, when trade relations intensified.

On his trip to Moscow, on February 4, President Alberto Fernández offered Russia to be "the gateway" to the region, a gesture that fell very badly in the US. The Argentine Foreign Ministry took refuge in the tradition of neutrality of his diplomacy, where there are neither friends nor enemies.

“The only alignment we have is with the interests of Argentine men and women.

Here there are no sides to choose, "said the foreign minister,

Argentina, like Brazil, did not support a condemnation of Russia in the OAS.

President Fernández had to resist the pro-Russian pressure that he received from sectors of his government alliance, especially from Kirchnerism, where the Russian invasion of Ukraine is, in his view, the fault of the United States and NATO's lock on the Kremlin. .

But as the days went by, and the intensification of the military offensive, the Casa Rosada adhered to tougher positions.

He joined the repudiation in the United Nations and this Tuesday, during the beginning of the legislative cycle in Buenos Aires, Fernández spoke of the Russian "invasion" of Ukraine;

he even asked for a minute of silence for the dead.

The opposition, meanwhile, charged against the Casa Rosada, which it accused of not aligning itself sufficiently with Western positions of repudiation.

While Fernández was speaking in Congress,

"Argentina carries out a foreign policy based on cooperative multilateralism," Fernández replied.

"It firmly supports peace, international security, the peaceful settlement of disputes, human rights, the defense of democracy and care for the environment."

At least for the moment, his government will not join the economic sanctions against Russia.

Subscribe here to the EL PAÍS América

and receive all the key information on current affairs in the region.