I have no relation to Trump, the president of Brazil Lula said to the BBC

Brazil’s president Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva told the BBC in an exclusive interview that he had “no relationship” with US President Donald Trump.

Lula has frequently criticized Trump, but it is the clearest signal for the moment he thinks that communication between him and his American counterpart is now broken.

Even if the United States has a trade surplus with Brazil, Donald Trump imposed prices of 50% on Brazilian products in July, citing the trial on the coup accusations of the former president of the right of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, as a trigger.

Lula has described prices as “eminently political” and said that US consumers are confronted at higher prices for Brazilian goods.

The prices imposed by Trump struck Brazilian exports to the United States, such as coffee and beef, which, according to Lula, would become more expensive: “The American people will pay for the errors that President Trump will incur in his relationship with Brazil.”

The two leaders never talked directly. When he pushed why he had not only tried to get the phone or form a relationship, President Lula said: “I never tried this call because he never wanted to have a conversation.”

Trump has already said that Lula can “call him at any time”. But Lula insisted that members of the Trump administration “do not want to speak”.

He told the BBC that he had discovered the American prices for Brazilian newspapers.

Referring to Trump, he said that the American president “did not communicate civilized. He has just published them (the prices) on his portal – on social networks”.

When he was asked how he would describe his relationship with his American counterpart, he simply said: “There is no relationship.”

Lula said his bad relations with the US leader were the exception, noting how he had established relations with the former American presidents, the British Prime Ministers, the EU, China, Ukraine, Venezuela and “all the countries of the world”.

The Brazilian president attended the anniversary’s birthday celebrations in Russia this year and has not reduced links with President Putin. Asked with whom he had a better relationship – Trump or Putin – he defended his links with the latter, saying that they had trained them when they were both presidents “in previous times”.

“I have no relationship with Trump because when Trump was elected the first time, I was not president. His relationship is with Bolsonaro, not Brazil,” said Lula.

He also said that if he went beyond Trump at the United Nations General Assembly next week, he “greet him because I am a civilized citizen”, but added that Trump could be “President of the United States, (but) he is not emperor of the world!”.

The BBC approached the White House to comment on Lula’s criticism with regard to Trump but had not yet received an answer for the publishing.

He also talked about his ruling predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, who was sentenced last week.

A majority 4-1 of the judges of the Supreme Court of Brazil admitted the ex-president guilty of having plotted a coup after losing the elections against Lula and sentenced him to 27 years in prison.

Lula told the BBC that Bolsonaro and his co-conspirators had “injured the country, attempted a coup and plotted my death”.

Referring to the calls of Bolsonaro lawyers said they would stay, Lula said that he hoped that Bolsonaro would continue “to present his defense” but that “for the moment he is guilty”.

He also criticized Trump for having “invented relief” by saying that Bolsonaro was persecuted and denouncing what the American chief said he was a lack of democracy in Brazil.

Lula also told the BBC that if the January 6 riots Capitol had performed in Brazil rather than in the United States, Trump would have been tried.

In the vast interview with the BBC, he also pleaded for the United Nations reform.

He criticized the fact that five countries – the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council – have the power to veto decisions and argued that this had won the balance in favor of those who won the Second World War, excluding nations representing billions of people like Brazil, Germany, India, Japan, as well as African countries.

The result, he said, was that the UN did not have “the strength to resolve conflicts” and the five permanent members made “unilateral” decisions concerning the war.

He defended his continuous alliances with Russia and China – two nations where unfair elections and human rights violations were documented – while calling for a more “democratic” UN.

Pressed on the continuous purchases of Russian oil by Brazil, while Russia made war in Ukraine, he said that Brazil was one of the first countries to condemn the occupation of Ukraine Russia and that “Brazil does not finance Russia, we buy oil from Russia because we have to buy oil like China, India United States to buy oil “.

He said that if the UN “worked”, neither the Ukrainian war nor the Gaza war – which he described as “not a war” but a “genocide” – would have occurred.

The BBC also questioned President Lula on the COP30 climate summit in November, when Brazil welcomed world leaders in the city of Amazon of Belém.

At the national level, the Brazilian president was criticized on his support for exploratory drilling for oil near the mouth of the Amazon river.

The Brazil Petrobas state oil company and other companies have bought blocks for exploration and expect licenses.

Her own Minister of the Environment, Marina Silva, firmly opposed the plans and certain conservation groups are afraid of risking spills of oil in waters near the Amazon.

President Lula insisted that Brazil strictly followed the law in his research and if there were oil spills, “Brazil would be responsible and responsible and would take care of any problem”.

He added that he supported a world without fossil fuels but “this moment has not yet come”.

“I want to know any country ready to have an energy transition and capable of abandoning fossil fuels,” he replied. But the question turned out to be controversial with the voters on the left.

Lula, who is 79, said that he had not yet decided to run for the 2026 presidential elections.

He said that his health and his party would determine this – as well as if it was politically opportune and if he had had a chance to win.

Lula recently slipped the ballot boxes, but received a boost after Trump imposed prices in Brazil.

He concluded by saying that his inheritance included reducing hunger, the drop in unemployment and income for the growth of the working class.