Celso Amorim is the Foreign Minister of Brazil,
a nation that has been punching way above its
usual weight in the diplomatic arena lately.
The home folks loved it when Amorim went
home from the Cancun WTO, where the trade
talks collapsed in ignominy.
Ignominy for the USA and Europe, that is.
Amorim got a standing ovation in his own
Congress.
He's not backing down over it, either.
His boss Lula, President of Brazil, is turning out
to be quite the globetrotter.
"Latin business leaders and intellectuals rated
the Brazilian president the most popular leader
in the Americas. By the year-end, he will have
visited a dizzying 27 countries. (...) Lula has big
plans. For a start, he is actively lobbying to get
Brazil a permanent seat on the United Nations
Security Council."
From Squalid Military Dictatorship to Diplomatic Superpower
At the WTO, the Brazilian diplomats somehow
managed to stick together a vast
coalition-of-the-willing that contained China,
India, and South Africa, plus Argentina, Bolivia,
Brazil itself, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba,
Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico,
Pakistan, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines,
Venezuela and even Thailand. That's more
than half the world's population.
