With the agreement with the European Union (EU) is one step away from falling and, after several twists and turns, the president Javier Milei decided to take part in the semi-annual summit of the Presidents of the USA the day after tomorrow Mercosurin Foz de Iguazu. A summit that threatens to fade even before it begins, since there is a high probability that the Council of Europe will not approve the signing of the agreement with the regional bloc planned for the same Saturday.
Milei’s presence in the Brazilian border town is confirmed by official sources THE NATIONwas in doubt for days as the EU prepared to vote on the delayed deal with Mercosur and amid internal disagreements over the date of the meeting. Regardless of whether the agreement is signed or not, Milei’s presence represents the decision to maintain relations with its neighbors, always with the idea of promoting (jointly or separately) tariff reductions that facilitate trade with other countries and blocs. “Mercosur has not achieved its original goal, it has curtailed economic freedoms and deprived the region’s private sector of its opportunities. There has been less and less market and community life,” said the president at the last summit in Buenos Aires.
While the President’s logistics traveled to the venue today, the Chancellor traveled Pablo Quirno Tomorrow, and for the first time since taking office, he will attend the meeting of the Common Market Council, made up of the chancellors and finance ministers of the five countries that make up the regional bloc.
Unexpectedly, a controversy arose yesterday with Brazil, the organizer of the summit, when the Secretary General of the Government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Guilherme BoulosHe described the publication of a map of the continent on Instagram on which Brazil appeared as a large favela and which Milei had reposted as a “shameful attack by the Argentine president”. The government later denied that the president had reposted the message, which then quickly disappeared from the social network.
Leaving the question aside, both Lula and the rest of Mercosur countries are waiting for definitions from the Council of Europe, which consists of the 27 member countries of the Council of Europe European Unionwho analyze in Brussels between today and tomorrow approve or postpone the delayed customs, trade and investment agreement with Mercosurwhich, despite regular advances for a quarter of a century, has not been fully unlocked.
The initial uncertainty gave way to pessimism in Mercosur. While Spain and Germany remain the company’s main drivers and they still hope to get the majority needed for approval, France and Italy are currently playing a central role in seeking to delay the agreement to please its agricultural sectors, protagonists of blockades and protests, given the possibility of competing with Mercosur without guarantees of success.
The Presidents Emmanuel Macron (France) and Giorgia Meloni (Italy) are colluding to postpone the signing until next year, a position that provoked the ire of Lula da Silva, who announced yesterday that he was terminating the contract with the Italian-based electricity company Enel due to the blackout in the city of São Paulo. “Now I know that they (the Europeans) will not be able to get his approval (in the European Council),” Lula said yesterday. “If we don’t do it now, Brazil will not sign any more agreements during my presidency. It’s good to know: we’ve been waiting for this agreement for 26 years. It’s cheaper for them (the Europeans) than for us,” he said, visibly upset, at a ministerial meeting.
More cautious, the President of Uruguay, Yamandu Orsiyesterday told his country’s media that “these negotiations are taking place in Europe, we have no confirmation yet”, although he admitted that postponing the signing was “a possibility”. The government, meanwhile, reiterated that the possibility of signing the agreement “depends on the Europeans.” A curiosity: yesterday evening, in a detailed conversation with Daniel Parisinialias El Gordo Dan, Milei directly praised Macron and Meloni in the Carajo streaming. He said of the French president that he was “a very intelligent guy, an unconventional mind,” and he described the Italian president as “a very good friend,” highlighting the shared struggle in the “culture war” before he came to power.
The meeting of Mercosur presidents also saw a complicated series of comings and goings that jeopardized its realization. It all started when Itamaraty changed the original date of the meeting, scheduled for the 2nd of this month, to this Saturday, the 20th. The Brazilian Foreign Ministry rightly assumed that the EU would not be ready to sign the agreement on the first date. Paraguay immediately protested against the change and warned – in an official communication to the Brazilian coordinator of Mercosur: Gisela Padovan− that there will be no Paraguayan representation on the 20th. Lula da Silva countered and suggested that the Mercosur meeting be held in Brasilia on January 14th. Paraguay protested against the new change and, according to government sources, it was Quirno who intervened between the two so that the meeting could take place on the 20th, albeit based in Foz de Iguazú, near the border with Paraguay and the Argentine province of Misiones.
Since the neighborhood is fine, Mercosur is waiting for news from the Belgian capital, where the President of the Council, Antonio Costa and representatives of the 27 members are debating a broad agenda that will include war conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, migration and EU enlargement. The deal with Mercosur on the agenda will keep both the Europeans and their potential South American partners on tenterhooks.
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