Alana Gandra
Reporter - Agência Brasil

Rio - The promotion of Brazilian and US trade with other nations is the objective of a bilateral work group already decided upon by the governments of the two countries, the Brazilian ambassador to the United States, Roberto Abdenur, informed the American Chamber of Commerce of Rio de Janeiro, yesterday (10).

"The idea is to facilitate and encourage bilateral exchanges and work together in third-party markets and in products in which the two countries' interests converge," he commented. He cited the case of soybeans, in which there exist "unreasonable barriers imposed by China on exports from Brazil and the United States." He went on to say: "We shall work together on these things. To a certain degree, we have already synchronized measures dealing with this."

According to the ambassador, Brazilian orange juice exporters sought him out to invite their US counterparts to "put aside the bilateral dispute" and join forces to increase both countries' sales to third-party markets.

In the political area, Abdenur said he is impressed by the degree of convergence that exists between the two countries. He pointed out that the differences in position concerning broader international issues, such as Brazil's condemnation of the war in Iraq and Brazil's adhesion to the Kyoto Protocol, "are the most natural thing in the world." These differences, he added, "at no point contaminated the good climate of the bilateral relationship."

Translation: David Silberstein