The summit of South American presidents in Brasilia gives a diplomatic boost to Nicolás Maduro

Nicolás Maduro and Lula da Silva in Brasilia, this Monday. Andre Borges (EFE)

It culminates, at least on a regional scale, the diplomatic rehabilitation of the president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, who on Tuesday has been received as an equal by the South American heads of state, gathered at an informal summit convened in Brasilia by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The purpose of the meeting was not, formally, to end the isolation of Chavismo but to promote South American integration. Lula, who with half a century of politics behind him is the dean of the presidents of the southern cone, wants his counterparts and him to put aside their undeniable ideological differences, cooperate more and seek a mechanism to act as a bloc in the face of global and local challenges. As expected, only Peruvian President Dina Boluarte has been absent.

Lula opened the meeting with the recognition of a failure: "In the region, we let ideologies divide us and interrupt the integration effort. We abandoned the channels of dialogue and the mechanisms of cooperation and, with that, we all lost." For this reason, he has encouraged his colleagues to renew "the commitment to South American integration" before proclaiming that "no country can face current systemic threats alone. Only by acting together will we be able to overcome them."

Maduro's first meeting with the other 10 presidents and Peru's representative was held behind closed doors. He probably hasn't been as uncritical as the host's reception on Monday. The bilateral meeting between the Brazilian and the Venezuelan was followed by a joint appearance in which the former did not refer to human rights violations although he did include the message that the next elections will be free. The president and leader of the Brazilian left has been widely criticized in his country — where he won the elections with a project to defend democracy and part of whose press describes Maduro as a dictator — for defending that accusations of authoritarianism or lack of democracy are part of an enemy narrative.

Colombian Gustavo Petro is the only one who spoke to the press upon arriving in Itamaraty. "Latin America must have a unified voice because it has great potential. It has in its own territory several of the important solutions to the integrated crisis of humanity, "said Petro, who, faithful to the fame that precedes him, has arrived last at the glass palace of Itamaraty, headquarters of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From its windows you can glimpse the heart of Brazilian democracy that five months ago suffered the violent assault of thousands of Bolsonaristas.

Before Petro (Colombia) have been arriving one by one, Lula (Brazil), Alberto Fernández (Argentina), Luis Arce (Bolivia), Gabriel Boric (Chile), Guillermo Lasso (Ecuador), Irfaan Ali (Guyana), Mario Abdo Benítez (Paraguay), Cha Santokhi (Suriname), Luis Lacalle Pou (Uruguay) and on behalf of Peru, its Prime Minister, Luis Alberto Otarola, so that this meeting, varied ideologically, It is a meeting without a president.

Gone is the previous term in which, with the far-right Jair Bolsonaro in the Presidency, Brazil became an international pariah. Lula has made no secret that he would like to resurrect Unasur, but he wants to listen to his counterparts. And it's far from clear that everyone else will embrace that plan. Although it was born as a club of all South American countries in the middle of a wave of leftist governments 15 years ago, the turn to the right that the South American electorate took from 2018 resulted in a scare of more than half of its members, who created a club of conservatives, Prosur. It would be a question of overcoming the stage of entities converted into clubs of friends of the left or of the right to organize themselves in the style of the African Union or the European Union.

The meeting has no agenda. The idea is an informal meeting in which frankness and trust reign. That is why the presidents attend with their chancellor and one or two advisers. No entourages. Each participant will make a morning intervention. After lunch it will be time for dialogue, for the exchange of ideas.

In Lula's inaugural speech, in Portuguese and the only one open to the press, he stressed that "a strong, self-confident and politically organized South America expands the possibilities" to effectively face the multiple challenges. Be it another pandemic, the climate crisis, inflation or the effect of Ukraine's war on food prices or fertilizer supplies.

The host stressed that together they would be the fifth largest economy in the world and in that line has been in favor of regional development banks acting in a concerted manner to finance projects and has opted for a monetary mechanism to reduce dependence on the dollar and the yuan ("extra-regional currencies"). Among the proposals, even an Erasmus student exchange.

Although South America is one of the most unequal regions in the world, where poverty and violence are entrenched, Lula has not missed the opportunity to remember: "We are a region of peace, without weapons of mass destruction, and where disputes are resolved through diplomatic channels."

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