The irony of a contempt

There are many curious stories in Brazilian diplomacy. But this one will be among the best. In short.

In 2010, the U.S. government has entrusted to Brazil and Turkey a special mission: to go to Iran and negotiate an exchange of nuclear fuel. Officially, the U.S. government placed itself as “willing to negotiate” and avoid sanctions.

And so they did: Lula and Erdogan, the Prime Minister of Turkey.

But the unexpected has come: the mission was successful. And was it not supposed to be? Well, not really. The sending of Lula and Erdogan was made relying on the obvious failure of the two countries, both diplomatically inexperienced and unprepared to deal with issues of “the grown ups”. The expected failure would serve to sustain new sanctions: “We tried to negotiate, but … you know Iran…”

Lula and Erdogan did what they was asked to. They went back home with the famous “Tehran Declaration” signed: Iran agreed to send 1.2 tons of its uranium to be enriched abroad, under the supervision of Turkey. With the mission that went wrong exactly because it worked out, the situation got tense.

The reaction came quickly. “Ah, but I did not authorize nor even asked for such agreement”, Obama said. Brazil and Turkey were discredited in the media, accused of vanity, anti-semitism, anti-americanism, makers of international agreements not allowed.

But times have changed. Brazil and Turkey may not have the experience of the major powers. Maybe so they have their own private codes and their own way of conducting things to an understanding.

The reaction of the Brazilian government: leak to the press a letter from Obama in which the President asks Lula and Erdogan to do exactly (no more, no less) what they did. “Who is lying now?”

Brazil is not be the super-powerful leader of the international complex joints, have not the strongest military power in the world and the country continues without a chair to sit on the UN Security Council. Brazil is just a guy who has suffered a lot, gained experience dealing with its internal issues, and it is no longer willing to accept certain things, and even much less willing to contribute to the maintenance of the bellicose posture that dominated the 20th century.

As the former President Lula declared, during the mission in Iran: “There are a million reasons why we have arguments to build peace and no argument for us to build the war.”

The full story about the episode has just been told in the book “A Single Roll of the Dice”, by the american analyst of Iranian origin Trita Parsi. The full article about it you can read in this link da BBC Brasil

Irã concorda em fazer troca de combustível nuclear na Turquia

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