Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said he would meet with other South American nations on Wednesday to establish a common strategy to defend the rainforest of the Amazon, while his foreign minister informed Reuters that the country should be seen as an environmental hero.
In an indication that Bolsonaro, a far-right conservative, forges closer connections with neighboring countries than with European nations, he accepted Chile’s four-aircraft offer to assist battle the fires that sweep through the world’s biggest rainforest.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting with Chilean President Sebastian Pinera in Brasilia, Bolsonaro said a meeting with regional neighbors except Venezuela to discuss the Amazon would take place on 6 September in Leticia, Colombia.
The two rulers said in a declaration that environmental problems must be met while respecting “national sovereignty.” “rational and sustainable use of their natural resources, in line with their environmental obligations and needs of their citizens, including indigenous peoples.”
Pinera, who has a close relationship with Bolsonaro, is an increasingly major figure in the environmental crisis caused by the Amazon fires and visited Brasilia when he returned from a G7 summit in France where he participated as Latin America’s rotating representative.
Following the election of Bolsonaro, Chile will hold the COP25 climate summit in December, having taken over from the initial host, Brazil.
Following a meeting later on Wednesday with Paraguayan President Mario Abdo, Pinera spoke about the need to create regional infrastructure to combat increasingly widespread forest fires in South America. Pinera said the effort could be helped by the new regional bloc Prosur.
Bolsonaro returned to a a spat with France, stating that Brazil’s sovereignty had “no price, not even $20 trillion,” a reference to a $20 million assistance offer announced by French President Emmanuel Macron at the weekend’s Group of Seven Wealthy Nations Summit. As an insulting effort to “buy” the sovereignty of Brazil, Bolsonaro rejected the offer.
Macron has accused Bolsonaro of lying about climate change, a long-time environmental skeptic.
“Only after it (the French government) has recanted what it said about my person, which represents Brazil … can we talk again,” Bolsonaro said.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Ernesto Araujo said in an interview with journalists that the nation was supporting Bolsonaro in his conflict with Macron.
He also said that Brazil was like never before fighting forest fires and he hoped “people who legitimately care about the environment see that Brazil is the hero and not the villain.”
Reporters on Wednesday discovered that the government of Bolsonaro had weakened the federal agency charged with defending the rainforest by cutting budgets, restricting the destruction of machinery used in environmental crime, and sidelining an elite force of enforcement officers.
During the dry season, the presidency said on Wednesday, Brazil’s federal government is preparing a presidential decree prohibiting fires from clearing land in the nation.
Bolsonaro had already agreed to the decree’s primary terms, according to one source.
Minister of the Environment Ricardo Salles, 44 years old, was admitted to a hospital on Tuesday after complaining about feeling unwell.
Brasilia’s Armed Forces Hospital said on Wednesday that after some medical assessments the minister was given the all-clear and told to rest for five days.