PORTO VELHO, Brazil, Aug 28, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Brazil’s President Jair
Bolsonaro is willing to accept foreign aid for fighting fires devastating the
Amazon rainforest, but only if the country controls the funds, his spokesman
said Tuesday.
The announcement suggests Bolsonaro has dropped an earlier demand that
French President Emmanuel Macron withdraw “insults” made against him before
he would accept a G7 offer to help put out the fires in the world’s largest
rainforest.
“The Brazilian government through President Bolsonaro is open to receiving
financial support from organizations and even countries,” Otavio Rego Barros
told reporters in the capital Brasilia, without referring specifically to the
G7’s offer.
“The essential point is that this money, on entering Brazil, will be under
the control of the Brazilian people.”
Bolsonaro has been involved in an escalating war of words with Macron over
the worst fires to hit the Amazon in years — blazes that have sparked a
global outcry and threatened to torpedo a huge trade deal between the
European Union and South American countries.
A top Brazilian official on Monday rejected the G7 countries’ offer of $20
million to combat the fires devastating the forest in Brazil and Bolivia,
saying Macron should take care of “his home and his colonies.”
“Mr Macron must withdraw the insults he made against me,” Bolsonaro told
reporters in the capital Brasilia earlier Tuesday.
“To talk or accept anything from France, with the best possible intentions,
he has to withdraw these words, and from there we can talk.”
Macron and Bolsonaro have repeatedly locked horns in the past week, with
the French leader accusing Bolsonaro of lying to him about his commitments on
climate change and vowing to block the EU-Mercosur trade deal involving
Brazil that took decades to negotiate.
– ‘Extraordinarily rude’ –
On Monday, Macron rebuked the “extraordinarily rude” Bolsonaro after the
Brazilian leader personally expressed approval for a Facebook post implying
that Brigitte Macron was not as attractive as his own first lady, Michelle
Bolsonaro.
Bolsonaro has hit back, accusing Macron of treating Brazil like “a colony
or no-man’s land.”
The latest official figures show 1,659 new fires were started in Brazil
between Sunday and Monday, taking the total this year to 82,285 — the
highest since at least 2013 — even as military aircraft and troops help
battle the blazes.
More than half of the fires are in the massive Amazon basin.
The governors of several states in the Amazon told Bolsonaro in a meeting
Tuesday that international help was needed.
Their plea comes after Norway and Germany halted around $70 million in
Amazon protection subsidies earlier this month.
Bolsonaro — a climate-change skeptic — has faced criticism at home over
his delayed response to the fires, and thousands have protested in Brazil in
recent days to denounce the destruction.
But US President Donald Trump tweeted that the Brazilian leader was
“working very hard on the Amazon fires and in all respects doing a great job
for the people of Brazil – Not easy.”
In response, Bolsonaro replied: “We’re fighting the wildfires with great
success. Brazil is and will always be an international reference in
sustainable development.”
“The fake news campaign built against our sovereignty will not work. The US
can always count on Brazil.”
– ‘Under control’ –
In the hard-hit northwestern state of Rondonia, thick smoke has choked the
capital Porto Velho in recent days as fires blacken swaths of the rainforest.
Defense Minister Fernando Azevedo e Silva on Monday said the fires were
“under control.”
“It has been exaggerated a little that the situation was out of control —
it wasn’t,” he said. “The situation isn’t simple but it is under control.”
Nearly 2,500 troops and 15 aircraft, including two C-130 Hercules, have
been deployed, according to the defense ministry, which has published
satellite data it says show a reduction in the number of fires in the nine
states spanning the Amazon.
More than 43,000 troops were available to help put out fires, the
government said previously.
Rain in some of the affected areas is also helping.
Experts say increased land clearing during the months-long dry season to
make way for crops or grazing has aggravated the recurring problem this year.
Although about 60 percent of the Amazon is in Brazil, the vast forest also
spreads over parts of eight other countries or territories, including the
French overseas territory of Guiana on the continent’s northeast coast.
Bolivia’s leftist President Evo Morales on Tuesday gave a half-hearted
welcome to the G7 aid pledge, which he described as “tiny.”
Morales and his rival for the Bolivian presidency have suspended
campaigning to deal with the voracious fires that the president said had
destroyed 1.2 million hectares, or more than 4,000 square miles, of forest
and grassland since May.