Liberal Initiative (IL) leader Rui Rocha believed that the presence of the President of Brazil in the Assembly of the Republic on April 25 represents an “instrumentalization” of the historic date, insisting that the party will only are represented by the parliamentary leader.
Speaking to journalists in Braga on the sidelines of a visit to the Associação Empresarial do Minho, Rui Rocha stressed that the parliamentary leader’s presence will serve to give IL a sign of respect for the Brazilian people and in defense of Ukraine .
“We do not accept that, when there is war in Europe, the ‘Putinist lobby’ of which Lula da Silva is a part imposes itself on the Portuguese on such an important date as April 25. But we want a sign that we do not accept this imposition “he said.
The IL parliament leader will attend the session in which Lula da Silva will participate, holding a symbol of the Ukrainian flag, while the rest of the bench will leave the room, he expected.
“We are here and face to face with Lula da Silva, for freedom and for Ukraine”said Rui Rocha.
The presence in parliament of the President of Brazil – who is visiting Portugal between April 22 and 25 – has been shrouded in controversy since Foreign Minister João Gomes Cravinho spoke explicitly in February in a speech by Lula da Silva at the session of the April revolution in the Assembly of the Republic, which marked the unprecedented character, which the opposition of PSD, IL and Chega deserved.
The parliament eventually decided that, instead of an intervention by the President of Brazil at the solemn annual memorial meeting, it would hold a separate welcome session on the same day during Lula da Silva’s state visit to Portugal.
On Saturday, at the end of a visit to China, Brazil’s president defended that “the United States should stop encouraging war” in Ukraine and that “the European Union should start talking about peace”.
In this way, he explained to journalists, the international community will be able to “convince” the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, that “peace is in the interest of the whole world.”
“Patience is needed” to talk to Putin and Zelensky, he said. “But above all, we have to convince the countries that supply weapons, that encourage war, to stop,” he added.
Source: DN
