The G-7 Exploits Fires to Attempt Internationalization of the Amazon

Aram Aharonian
The ferocious fires that have devastated almost half a million hectares of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil also ignited the meeting of the Group of Seven in France and scorched and left in critical condition the free trade agreement signed recently between the European Union and Mercosur.

Paradoxically, the surrender of the neoliberal governments of Mercosur saved the union of the seven most industrialized capitalist countries (United States, Canada, France, Italy, Germany, Great Britain and Japan) and gave a boost to French President Emmanuel Macron to re-launch himself as an international figure defending the environment.

But the most remarkable thing is that in the international collective imagination he painted the Mercosur countries (Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay) as incompetent underdeveloped countries that need the tutelage of the “civilized” world to survive, because if left alone they will destroy the planet.

The Amazon fires spread with unexpected rapidity to the field of European diplomacy, when French President Emmanuel Macron accused his Brazilian counterpart, Jair Bolsonaro, of having lied to him about his environmental commitments and announced his decision to oppose the FTA between the EU and Mercosur.

Macron took advantage of the enormous fire in the Amazon, Bolsonaro’s provocative words and, especially, the absence of intelligent and sovereign responses from the other three Mercosur countries (Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay), not only to attack the recently signed secret agreement but also to open the door to the G-7 offensive for the internationalization of the Amazon, the lung of the planet (and, of course, its resources).

The mini-diplomatic crisis spread to the rest of Europe, and Macron’s decision was supported by Ireland. Germany and Canada also urged discussion on the issue of the Amazon. Macron, in a speech described as Manichean, pointed out that because of Bolsonaro and his policy in the Amazon he will oppose the agreement between the European Union and Mercosur, which served to conceal once again the responsibilities of the seven powers in the current dramas, among them the global inequality they promote.

According to documents published this week by a British website, Bolsonaro and his cabinet flooded with soldiers would have a very precise plan for the Amazon: to build a highway and a hydraulic plant in the heart of the jungle, a project that dates back to the time of the Brazilian military dictatorship (1964-1983).

The reaction of the French government was taken with caution by the Argentine government, which had celebrated the unequal free trade agreement between Mercosur and the EU, sealed in June after 20 years of negotiations. But the neoliberal government of Mauricio Macri is on its way out, which makes it doubtful that this FTA will be approved in Congress, given the opposition of trade unions, businesses and, above all, the productive sector.

Macron did not speak, of course, of Japan and its predatory whaling, Germany and its multinational Bayer, owner of the ecoterrorist Monsanto, Italy and its contempt for the human condition in the face of the crisis of migrants in the Mediterranean, and all as promoters and suppliers of arms that feed conflicts like that of Yemen, support dictatorships and crush the Middle East region.

In a speech more mediatic than political, Macron challenged the citizens to “respond to the call of the oceans and the jungle that is burning”, without forgetting that because of its colonial policy still in force, France is also situated as an Amazonian country (French Guyana). “We are not going to launch a simple appeal but a mobilization of all the powers” gathered in Biarritz, and this “in partnership with the countries of the Amazon to fight against fire and invest in reforestation,” he said.

Also the current president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, questioned the ratification of the trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur if the president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, does not fight the fires in the Brazilian Amazon. Similarly, Tusk warned that “it will not facilitate” the United Kingdom leaving the EU without prior agreement.

While France and Ireland threatened not to approve this agreement, Finland, which currently presides over the European Union, proposed imposing restrictions on meat imports from Brazil, the world’s second meat supplier, as a way of pressuring the country to preserve the Amazon. “There is no possibility that Ireland will vote in favour of the agreement if Brazil does not respect its environmental commitments,” warned Irish Premier Leo Varadkar.

Macron’s reaction came in the midst of extreme tension between the two countries, a day after Bolsonaro accused him of “having a colonialist mentality”, which “instrumentalises an internal issue of Brazil and other Amazonian countries” with “a sensationalist tone that does nothing to solve the problem”.

Signed at the end of June, the EU-Mercosur agreement, which would create a market of 780 million consumers, is criticized not only in Mercosur countries, but also in Europe by the agricultural sector of several countries, as well as by environmentalists and NGOs. European parliamentarians – on the sidelines of the G-7 summit – had warned of Bolsonaro’s threat to “leave Mercosur” if the Alberto Fernández-Cristina Kirchner formula were to win elections in Argentina next October.

Some European analysts prefer to interpret the crisis between Brazil and some European countries as a triumph of Donald Trump, Bolsonaro’s ally and climate change skeptic (like his Brazilian imitator), enemy of multilateralism, the EU and the EU-Mercosur agreement.

But beyond the unequal free trade agreement, South Americans must understand that behind the discourses of environmental protection, in the minds of the leaders of the seven main capitalist countries is the seizure of the planet’s lungs and its enormous wealth.

Aram Aharonian: Uruguayan journalist and communicologist. Master in Integration. Founder of Telesur. He presides over the Foundation for Latin American Integration (FILA) and directs the Latin American Center for Strategic Analysis (CLAE, http://www.estrategia.la).

Translation by Internationalist 360°