Buenos Aires, September 2 (RHC)-- Argentinean President Mauricio Macri has endorsed Brazil’s de facto President Michel Temer after the Senate ousted Dilma Rousseff in an impeachment bid, representing the latest in a wave of right-wing attempts to restore conservative politics in the region.
In a statement issued Wednesday, Macri’s government expressed its “respect for the verified institutional process” in Brazil that ousted Rousseff and his willingness to continue working with the Temer government, with which Macri already held a friendly relationship during his “interim” months in office.
Under Macri and Temer, Argentina and Brazil have pivoted in their foreign relations, scrapping the regional integration focus of their progressive predecessors in favor of strengthening ties with the United States and shunning neighboring governments.
The two countries, along with Paraguay, have also formed a bloc within the sub-regional South American economic alliance Mercosur in recent months to frustrate the passing of the pro-tempore presidency from Uruguay to Venezuela.
Paraguay, which saw a similar parliamentary coup oust democratically-elected left-wing President Fernando Lugo in 2012, also stated support for Brazil’s de facto government. Foreign Minister Eladio Loizaga told reporters that the country “respects” the decision to impeach Rousseff, saying that it was “taken by democratic institutions.”
Chile similarly expressed “confidence in Brazil to resolve its own challenges through its democratic institutions.”
Former Argentinean President Cristina Fernandez, former Uruguayan President Jose “Pepe” Mujica, and Peru’s Broad Front party all condemned Dilma Rousseff’s removal as a coup with negative consequences for the region.
The Paraguayan coalition Frente Guasu, the political movement of former deposed President Fernando Lugo, who was ousted in a parliamentary coup in 2012 that paved the way for the entrenchment of neo-liberalism under a right-wing government, also condemned the process in Brazil by likening it to the right-wing maneuvering in Paraguay four years ago.
