'Axis of evil' would expand, expert warns www.globeandmail.com By JEFF SALLOT Friday, January 10, 2003 – Print Edition, Page A8

OTTAWA -- Brazil is scrambling to clean up the diplomatic fallout from a suggestion by its rookie Science Minister that the country needs to know how to build nuclear bombs.

The comments -- since "clarified" by Brazilian diplomats -- tripped alarms at the United Nations and in Washington, where jittery officials are trying to deal with nuclear crises in North Korea and Iraq, and hardly need a new one in South America.

For Brazil or others, hinting about going nuclear as part of a strategy to win respect internationally is bound to backfire, some experts said.

"This unfortunate statement has done political damage," said Luis Bitencourt, director of the Brazil Project at Washington's Woodrow Wilson Center.

Any hint that the newly elected government of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is trying to revive Brazil's nuclear ambitions would be exploited by suspicious U.S. right-wingers, who would lump Brazil in with U.S. President George W. Bush's so-called axis of evil, Mr. Bitencourt said.

Brazilian officials have to be careful about their words because many UN members remember that the country's military dictatorship tried to develop nuclear weapons, Mr. Bitencourt said. Brazil has the most advanced nuclear-energy and research programs in Latin America.

The furor was set off by a radio interview this week in which Science and Technology Minister Roberto Amaral was asked whether Brazil needs to develop the knowledge to manufacture nuclear weapons.

"We cannot renounce any scientific knowledge -- the knowledge of the genome, the knowledge of DNA, the knowledge of nuclear fission," he said.

Earlier in the interview, Mr. Amaral said Brazil is against nuclear proliferation but cannot erase its knowledge of the technology.

The minister said that although Brazil is a country of peace, it needs modern armed forces with "high technological development."

When the interview was broadcast on the Portuguese-language service of the British Broadcasting Corp., it set off alarms at the Vienna headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The IAEA, the UN's watchdog on nuclear-proliferation questions, is involved with crises in Iraq, where its inspectors are looking for evidence of a nuclear-weapons program, and with North Korea, which recently expelled UN nuclear-program inspectors.

The agency sought clarification from Brazil, and is satisfied that the country intends to adhere to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said last night.

The Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Relations said there has been no change in the country's fundamental commitment to renounce the development of nuclear weapons.

The ministry noted that the Brazilian constitution prohibits bringing nuclear weapons into the country aboard the ships of other countries. Other officials vowed that Brazil favours nuclear research only for peaceful purposes.

Brazil and rival neighbour Argentina halted their nuclear-weapons programs in the mid-1980s. But there are suspicions that at least some Brazilians want the weapons to give the country extra diplomatic heft to match its emergence as an economic power.

During the fall presidential-election campaign, Mr. da Silva criticized the non-proliferation treaty, saying it favours the original nuclear-weapons states -- the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain.

www.guardian.co.uk Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles Friday January 10, 2003 The Guardian

The Bush administration yesterday announced a new job - in effect a demotion - for Otto Reich, the controversial Cuban-American who has been responsible for policy in Latin America for the past year.

The decision is a climbdown which acknowledges that the Senate, even with its new Republican majority, will not confirm Mr Reich as assistant secretary of state for the western hemisphere.

Mr Reich, a hardline anti-communist, has been accused of supporting terrorists in Central America and appearing to welcome a military coup in Venezuela.

The White House spokesman Ari Fleischer announced that Mr Reich would be joining the National Security Office in a minor role. It was described by Latin American analysts as a consolation prize.

Mr Fleischer said Mr Reich would be reporting to the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, in his new post.

"Ambassador Reich has a distinguished record of service to the United States both outside and in government," he said.

The new chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee, the moderate Republican Richard Lugar, had already made it clear that he would not vote to confirm Mr Reich.

The administration had considered submitting his name again but has decided to avoid an embarrassing rebuff by the committee.

Mr Reich was able to occupy the post last year because President Bush used a formula called a recess appointment, which let him take office without Senate confirmation.

In November he was temporarily named as the state department's special envoy to Latin America, reporting to the secretary of state, Colin Powell, but Mr Powell was said to be uncomfortable about the presence of such a controversial figure.

Now he has been moved again to a lesser post.

"This is a consolation prize, a face-saver," said Larry Birns, the director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs which monitors Latin American politics.

He said that Mr Reich had originally been appointed to placate "the Miami Cubans", who are a significant body of support for the governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, the president's brother.

He added that Mr Powell had become increasingly aware of the negative effect Mr Reich's position had on Latin American relations, particularly since the election of the leftwingers Ignacio Lula da Silva in Brazil and Lucio Gutierrez in Ecuador.

Last April Mr Reich came under scrutiny for apparently welcoming the military coup which led to the brief removal from office of President Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.

More recently he angered the Venezuelan government by saying: "An election is not sufficient to call a country a democracy."

The Venezuelan vice-president, Jose Vicente Rangels, called him "a clown".

Mr Reich, 57, rose to promi nence in the 80s when he was a public diplomacy adviser at the state department.

He used his office to promote the cause of the contras, who were then trying to overthrow the leftwing Sandinista government in Nicaragua. An investigation by the comptroller general found that Mr Reich's office had engaged in "prohibited, covert propaganda" on the contras' behalf.

He has been accused by his critics of supporting terrorism by his assistance to the contras. He was also accused of assisting the convicted Cuban terrorist Orlando Bosch to gain the right to live in the US, an accusation he has denied.

The assistant secretary of state appointment will probably be taken by the Panamanian-American Roger Francisco Noriega, who has been the US representative to the Organisation of American States, and is considered less confrontational.

Mr Birns predicted that Mr Reich would shortly return to the business world, where he used to be a lobbyist for Lockheed Martin and Bacardi rum.

www.iht.com Larry Rohter The New York Times Friday, January 10, 2003   RIO DE JANEIRO A senior official in the leftist government that took power last week has set off a furor here and alarmed neighboring countries by maintaining that Brazil, Latin America's largest nation, should acquire the capacity to produce a nuclear weapon.

"Brazil is a country at peace, that has always preserved peace and is a defender of peace, but we need to be prepared, including technologically," Roberto Amaral, the newly appointed minister of science and technology, said in an interview with the BBC that was broadcast this week. "We can't renounce any form of scientific knowledge, whether the genome, DNA or nuclear fission," he added. Amaral's remarks, coming as the United States faces a nuclear crisis with North Korea and is preparing for war with Iraq over its weapons programs, has reawakened debate over Brazil's own nuclear energy and research program, the most advanced in Latin America.

On Tuesday, a spokesman for President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was quick to distance the new president from Amaral's pronouncement that "mastery of the atomic cycle is important" to Brazil, saying that the minister's remarks were not an expression of official policy.

"The government favors research in this area solely and exclusively for peaceful purposes," the spokesman, Andre Singer, said at a news briefing in Brasilia.

Nevertheless, Amaral's declarations echoed a certain discontent expressed by da Silva as a candidate last year. In a speech in Rio de Janeiro in September, he criticized the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as unjustly favoring the United States and other countries that already had nuclear weapons, asking, "If someone asks me to disarm and keep a slingshot while he comes at me with a cannon, what good does that do?"

Those remarks were made to a group of retired military officers, many of whom supported the ambitious nuclear program undertaken by the military dictatorship that ruled Brazil from 1964 to 1985, and the remarks caused immediate alarm in Brazil. The environmental organization Greenpeace, for example, criticized da Silva's position, as did groups of scientists in Brazil and abroad and even members of his own Workers' Party. Da Silva later issued a "clarification" saying that Brazil did not intend to develop nuclear weapons.

The Brazilian Constitution, promulgated in 1988, forbids the development of nuclear weapons or their presence in the country. That action was taken a year after the government announced it had developed the technology to enrich uranium, but it was not until Fernando Henrique Cardoso took office in 1995 that Brazil agreed to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Until the mid-1980s, Brazil and its neighbor and traditional rival, Argentina, had programs aimed at developing the ability to produce atomic bombs. But after military dictatorships in both countries gave way to democratic rule, civilian presidents negotiated an end to those programs.

newsobserver.com Thursday, January 9, 2003 5:18PM EST By MICHAEL ASTOR, ASSOCIATED PRESS

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - Brazil said Thursday it plans to pursue a broad range of nuclear research, but has no intention of making atomic weapons.

The statement came in response to comments this week by Science and Technology Minister Roberto Amaral, which stoked fears in some circles that Brazil might develop a nuclear weapon. "The Ministry of Science and Technology emphatically manifests its position against any activity related to the production of nuclear arms," the ministry said in a statement. "We are committed to scientific and technological development in all areas of knowledge, and placing that knowledge at the service of human progress and the construction of a more just society."

In an interview aired Sunday night on the British Broadcasting Corp., Amaral said Brazil "can't renounce any form of scientific knowledge, whether the genome, DNA or nuclear fission."

Although Amaral prefaced his comments by saying the country had no intention of making a nuclear weapon, many feared the new government of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva might reinvigorate Brazil's nuclear energy program, Latin America's most advanced.

The government had originally said it would clarify its position with the International Atomic Energy Agency, but Brazil's Foreign Ministry said Thursday it considered the ministry statement sufficient clarification.

Presidential spokesman Andre Singer sounded a similar theme, saying "the government is in favor of research in these areas for peaceful ends only and exclusively."

During last year's presidential campaign, Silva criticized the nuclear nonproliferation treaty as being biased in favor of the United States in a speech before a group of retired military officers.

"I want a strong Brazil, respected economically, technically and militarily," he said at the time, adding that he planned to reactivate a $100 million plan to build a nuclear submarine.

Brazil, which has two functioning nuclear reactors and a third in the works, has signed the nonproliferation treaty.

Reuters, 01.09.03, 6:07 PM ET By Doug Palmer

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick Thursday urged Brazil to make an "ambitious" offer to open its market to more imports as part of negotiations on a proposed Western Hemisphere free trade zone.

In a round-table discussion with reporters, Zoellick said he remained hopeful of working with Brazil's new leftist government to complete talks on the Free Trade Area of the Americas agreement by the target of January 2005.

But he repeated the United States was prepared to move forward with other trade negotiations within the Hemisphere if Brazil begins dragging its feet in the FTAA talks.

"If you get stuck, we're not getting stuck, we're moving on," Zoellick said in comments directed at the Brazilians.

Countries face a Feb. 15 deadline for making their initial market opening offers in the FTAA negotiations.

However, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva took office just last week and there are indications his new administration could miss the deadline by 30 days.

Zoellick said that was understandable given the new team's need to review the issues.

"But I urged them to move relatively quickly so it's not viewed as a slippage of their interest in the talks," he said. "The question to watch here is how ambitious will Brazil be and how does it fit into their larger development strategy."

Zoellick, who attended Lula's inauguration last week, said Brazil's domestic situation requires export-oriented policies to generate growth. But opening the Brazilian market to more imports should also be a part of that strategy, he said.

Lula has warned his government would be a tough negotiator in the FTAA talks, pushing hard for the United States to lower its import barriers on sugar, citrus, steel and other goods important to Latin America's largest economy.

Zoellick said the United States would be just as tough, pressuring Brazil to lower its tariffs on "sensitive" products such autos and computers, to strengthen its protections against illegal copying of U.S. movies, music and books and to allow more U.S. participation in its services sector.

On Wednesday, the United States formally began negotiations with five Central American countries on a free trade pact with a goal of finishing by the end of the year. That followed completion of a similar agreement with Chile in December.

Those initiatives show the United States has more options to expanding trade in the hemisphere than just the FTAA, Zoellick said.

"I've had the Colombians, the Peruvians, the Bolivians, the Uruguayans all want to do free trade agreements," he said. "Our position is we want to move the FTAA, but the doors are open" to other agreements if that becomes stalled.