Luis Ayllón
The President of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, will arrive in Madrid on Tuesday, the 25th, for a visit to Spain, as part of his first tour of Europe following his return to office, which will begin tomorrow, Saturday, in Portugal.
Announcing Lula’s trip, Maria Luisa Escorel, the Brazilian Foreign Ministry’s secretary for Europe, explained at a press conference that the trip is part of Brazil’s “return to the world”, from which it has remained almost isolated for the last four years, under the rule of the far-right Jair Bolsonaro.
Escorel stressed that Portugal and Spain are Brazil’s natural gateways to Europe, and, in fact, one of the main issues on Lula’s agenda is to seek the support of Madrid and Lisbon to try to close the trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosur.
The Brazilian leader hopes that progress can be made towards concluding the agreement between Brussels and Mercosur -of which it forms part, along with Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay- during the six months of the Spanish Presidency of the EU, which begins on 1 July, and he will explain this to the head of the Spanish government, Pedro Sánchez, at the meeting they are due to hold on Wednesday 26 April.
Escorel told journalists that “there are expectations that the agreement can be concluded this year and both Spain and Brazil are interested in finalising it during these presidencies”.
After his arrival in Madrid on Tuesday, Lula will go to the Zarzuela Palace to be received by His Majesty the King, after taking part in a seminar that will bring together Brazilian and Spanish businessmen.
Lula’s first tour of Europe since taking up the presidency of Brazil again comes after having visited Argentina, the United States and China, and having received the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, in Brasilia. Lula wants to push forward his plans to try to create a ‘G-20 for peace’ to put an end to the war in Ukraine and is now looking for support among Europeans.
Lula’s visit to Spain will take place almost 20 years after the visit he made during his previous term in office, in September 2023, when he was received by King Juan Carlos and the then Prime Minister, José María Aznar.
Before travelling to Madrid, Lula will meet in Lisbon with the Portuguese president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and will participate in the 13th Brazil-Portugal Summit, a bilateral mechanism that provides for annual meetings but has been paralysed since 2016.
In Portugal, she will also attend a business forum in the city of Matosinhos, some 300 kilometres from Lisbon, and will participate in the presentation of the Camoes prize to Brazilian singer-songwriter Chico Buarque.
