US President George W. Bush on Sunday ramped up his efforts to curb Venezuela and Cuba's clout in Latin America, accusing them of trying to "roll back" fragile democratic and free-market gains in the region.
After talks with Brazilian Pres-ident Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Bush bowed to his host's view that successful WTO negotiations have to precede new talks on creating the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA).
Bush, who reportedly brought his own food and chef to the Summit of the Americas in Argentina, also made a point on Sunday of praising Brazil's shared passion with his home state of Texas: barbecue.
PHOTO: EPA
Lula served Bush -- who was on his first visit to Brazil -- trad-itional fare of beef, lamb, ox tail and some cheese, according to the White House.
The US president, who had predicted the meal "will remind me of home," later declared the meal "unbelievably good barbeque."
He also promised to take Lula up on a fishing invitation once he leaves the White House.
Amid concerns in Washington that poverty may enhance the appeal of anti-US, economically populist messages, Bush said in a speech that "ensuring social justice for the Americas requires choosing between two competing visions."
"One offers a vision of hope. It is founded on representative government, integration into the world community and a faith in the transformative power of freedom," he told students, diplomats and business leaders.
"The other seeks to roll back the democratic progress of the past two decades by playing to fear, pitting neighbor against neighbor and blaming others for their own failures to provide for their people," he said.
He never named Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez or Cuban leader Fidel Castro, but White House aides tacitly acknowledged that they were the targets of what was the keynote speech of a five-day, three-country trip to the region.
Bush also celebrated US ties with the region's richest economy despite opposition here to his vision for a mammoth hemispheric free-trade zone stretching from Canada to Chile.
"He has got to be convinced, just like the people of America must be convinced, that a trade arrrangement in our hemisphere is good for jobs, is good for the quality of life," Bush conceded during a joint appearance.
In a joint statement, the two leaders vowed to work together to promote improved governance, regional and trans-regional dial-ogues, development and poverty alleviation.
Bush and Chavez stayed away from each other at the 34-nation summit in Argentina, where Venezuela and four other countries including Brazil blocked progress on the FTAA. Castro was not invited.
Brazil has said there is no point in doing so until after the so-called Doha Round of WTO talks, which have bogged down over agricultural subsidies -- the same chief obstacle in the Americas trade debate.
Lula called US aid to its farmers "unjustified barriers to our bilateral trade" and that he and Bush had explored their differences "without surprises or confrontations."
Earlier, in a roundtable discussion with prominent Brazilians, Bush shrugged off the sometimes violent protests he attracted at the summit in Argentina, saying: "I expect there to be dissent. That's what freedom is all about."
Outside the residence where Bush and Lula met, some 200 protesters chanted "Fascist Bush, the real terrorist" and burned an effigy of the US president dressed in a shirt with a swastika.
Also see story:
Americas' free-trade zone facing an uphill struggle
SUPPORT: Elon Musk’s backing for the far-right AfD is also an implicit rebuke of center-right Christian Democratic Union leader Friedrich Merz, who is leading polls German Chancellor Olaf Scholz took a swipe at Elon Musk over his political judgement, escalating a spat between the German government and the world’s richest person. Scholz, speaking to reporters in Berlin on Friday, was asked about a post Musk made on his X platform earlier the same day asserting that only the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party “can save Germany.” “We have freedom of speech, and that also applies to multi-billionaires,” Scholz said alongside Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal. “But freedom of speech also means that you can say things that are not right and do not contain
Two US Navy pilots were shot down yesterday over the Red Sea in an apparent “friendly fire” incident, the US military said, marking the most serious incident to threaten troops in over a year of US targeting Yemen’s Houthi rebels. Both pilots were recovered alive after ejecting from their stricken aircraft, with one sustaining minor injuries. However, the shootdown underlines just how dangerous the Red Sea corridor has become over the ongoing attacks on shipping by the Iranian-backed Houthis despite US and European military coalitions patrolling the area. The US military had conducted airstrikes targeting Yemen’s Houthi rebels at the
Pulled from the mud as an infant after the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 and reunited with his parents following an emotional court battle, the boy once known as “Baby 81” is now a 20-year-old dreaming of higher education. Jayarasa Abilash’s story symbolized that of the families torn apart by one of the worst natural calamities in modern history, but it also offered hope. More than 35,000 people in Sri Lanka were killed, with others missing. The two-month-old was washed away by the tsunami in eastern Sri Lanka and found some distance from home by rescuers. At the hospital, he was
MILITANTS TARGETED: The US said its forces had killed an IS leader in Deir Ezzor, as it increased its activities in the region following al-Assad’s overthrow Washington is scrapping a long-standing reward for the arrest of Syria’s new leader, a senior US diplomat said on Friday following “positive messages” from a first meeting that included a promise to fight terrorism. Barbara Leaf, Washington’s top diplomat for the Middle East, made the comments after her meeting with Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus — the first formal mission to Syria’s capital by US diplomats since the early days of Syria’s civil war. The lightning offensive that toppled former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad on Dec. 8 was led by the Muslim Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in al-Qaeda’s
RSS