Air Letter from Mexican Embassy, Rio de Janeiro

AIR MAIL

From Brazilian Embassy

Number 1607

Expedient 81-0/210

SUBJECT: Brazil’s international policy

Rio de Janeiro, 27 October 1962

C. Secretary of Foreign Relations

General Directorate of the Diplomatic Service [Dirección General del Serivcio Diplomático]

Mexico, D.F.

1900

On the occasion of the recent international crisis, the Minister of War, General Amaury Kruel, declared on the 23rd of the current [month], to the “Journal do Brasil” that “the armed forces of Brazil are united and closely adhered to the position adopted by the Government in the current international situation.” General Amaury Kruel added, “we are ready to carry out the decisions of the last Conference of Punta del Este, especially in the anticipated case that a foreign nation provides offensive weapons to another nation of the Continent.”

In its edition on the 24th the said newspaper published a journalistic summary of these declarations (see Annex 1).

On the other hand, the Foreign Minister [Canciller] Hermes Lima affirmed on the 24th of the current month before a group of women and students that went to the Itamaraty to express their support for the measures adopted by the North American Government that Brazil voted in favor of necessary measures to impede the traffic of offensive weapons in the Continent, but that it will not vote in favor of a condemnation of the Cuban regime, because “it does not correspond Brazil to condemn or authorize the invasion of the island.” The Brazilian Foreign Minister was referring to the position taken by the Brazilian Delegate in the Council of the Organization of American States [OAS], acting provisionally as an Organ of Consultation, in the course of the voting of the resolution that was approved on the 23rd of the current [month].

Professor Hermes Lima added that: “we voted [for] the necessary measures to impede the transport of offensive weapons to Cuba, and to any other country of America, in keeping with what we approved in Punta del Este, with respect to the prohibition of such weapons in the Continent. We voted without indecisions and freely, against the accumulation of nuclear material in America [i.e., the Western Hemisphere]. What we did not vote on and will not vote for is a condemnation of the Cuban regime or for an authorization of the invasion. It is necessary to distinguish between the accumulation of nuclear weapons in the Americas and the measures that tend towards overthrowing a population’s domestic regime. The “Jornal do Brasil” on the 25th of the current [month] publishes a journalistic report about this. (See Annex 2)

Finally, I enclose the text of an editorial published the same day in the “Diario de Noticias” that refers likewise to the Cuban question.

I reiterate to you the assurances of my most esteemed and distinguished consideration.

EFFECTIVE SUFFRAGE. NO REELECTION.

THE AMBASSADOR

Lic. Alfonso Garcia Robles.

Attached.

c.c.p. General Directorate [Direccion General] for International Organizations.