Lula denies defending Putin and says he is on the side of peace

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) denied that he defends Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s positions regarding the war in Ukraine.

“I don’t defend Putin. Brazil was the first country to criticize Russia for the invasion of Ukraine. What I don’t do is take sides. My side is peace. My side is not to side with Zelensky against Putin, or with Putin against Zelensky”, said the president, in Geneva, Switzerland.

Lula’s statements were made while he explained why he did not accept an invitation to participate in the Peace Summit in Ukraine, which will be held this weekend, on the 15th and 16th of June, in Switzerland.

“We did not participate in the Peace Summit because I had sent a letter to the president [da Suíça, Viola Patricia Amherd] explaining that Brazil will not participate in a summit that only has one side”, highlighted the Brazilian leader.

Organized by Switzerland, the summit has the full support of Ukraine and its Western allies, who did not invite Russian representatives to participate in the event.

Lula criticized this stance: “the war is being waged by two nations. In other words, if you want to find peace, you have to bring the two of them to a negotiating table. If you only put one side, you don’t want peace. In fact, you don’t want peace.”

The organizers of the meeting claim that President Vladimir Putin was not invited because he has no interest in negotiating a fair peace, and his country was responsible for starting the conflict by invading Ukraine without any military provocation.

Despite not attending the event, Lula reiterated that Brazil remains willing to help find a path to peace on the European continent.

“I told the president of Switzerland that Brazil has every interest, that we are available and that we have already spoken with China [sobre uma proposta de paz]he highlighted.

“Just this week Putin called me and I showed him the need for us to find a solution, sit down at a negotiating table and stop killing so that people can start working”, added the Brazilian president.

Lula, however, avoided directly answering whether a possible peace agreement would involve the formal annexation of Ukrainian territories by the Kremlin.

“I don’t know. I think there has to be an agreement. Now, if Zelensky says he doesn’t talk to Putin and Putin says he doesn’t talk to Zelensky, it’s because they’re enjoying the war. Because, otherwise, they would have already sat down to talk and find a peaceful solution,” he said.

“Any peaceful solution kills fewer people, destroys less and is more beneficial,” he said.

On other trips abroad, the president provoked controversy by saying, for example, that Western aid to the Ukrainian resistance was, in fact, only prolonging the war.

These statements were criticized by the West, which would like to have Brazil’s support for the Ukrainian resistance, a victim of the Russian invasion.