President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva stated, this Wednesday (17), that the agreement between Mercosur and the European Union has one last chance, in his mandate, to be consolidated next Saturday (20), in Foz do Iguaçu (PR), during the Mercosur Leaders’ Summit. 
“If I don’t do it now, Brazil won’t do it again while I’m president,” he said. Lula held the last ministerial meeting of 2025at the official residence of Granja do Torto, in Brasília.
The president stated that he still expects the agreement to be approved.
“If they say no, we will be tough from now on. We gave in to everything possible,” added the president.
The president said that he changed the date of the meeting to December 20th at the request of the European Union and that he was informed about the difficulty of approving the agreement with Mercosur due to internal pressure in France and Italy.
The European Union and Mercosur completed negotiations on the agreement last December, some 25 years after the talks began. The parliaments of the countries in both blocs need to approve the text, which may face resistance from countries like Francewho question the terms of the agreement, especially those dealing with agricultural production.
Tension in Venezuela
Still at the ministerial meeting, on the external environment, Lula expressed concern about the rise in tensions between the United States and Venezuela.
“I’m concerned about President (Donald) Trump’s attitudes toward Latin America. We’re going to have to be very careful about this issue.”
Lula reaffirmed the need for Brazil and the continent to have a “peace policy”, in view of not having nuclear weapons. “Here (in Brazil), we haven’t had the habit of war for 200 years. And that’s why I spoke to President Trump: the power of words can be worth more than the power of weapons”, he considered.
He reported that he spoke with President Trump about his willingness to contribute to a conversation between him and Maduro. “You need to be willing to talk and have patience,” said Lula.
Quality leap
Domestically, President Lula defended a leap in quality in public policies.
“I’m in government and I have an obligation to be honest with the people and show exactly what I did. When we talk about Bolso da Família, it’s not just our program, it’s Brazil’s program.”
For the president, the country is in a “broadly favorable” situation, although, according to him, this does not appear as strongly as it should in public opinion polls due to the political polarization in the country. Lula said that the team’s speech needs to be defined for next year’s electoral process.
