France's Macron visits Brazil after four years of tensions

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00:00 The French and Brazilian presidents have announced a billion-dollar Euro green investment plan

00:05 to protect the Amazon rainforest.

00:07 Emmanuel Macron met with longtime ally Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in the Amazon city of

00:12 Belém, which will host a key UN climate summit next year.

00:16 This was day one of Macron's three-day state visit to Brazil.

00:19 The leaders are looking to revive bilateral relations after years of friction with the

00:23 former Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro.

00:26 Our correspondent Jana Nosko gave us the latest from Rio.

00:30 It's particularly significant in Brazil.

00:33 It's the first visit by a French president for 11 years, and it comes after four years

00:39 of tensions between the two countries, between President Macron and former President Bolsonaro,

00:46 Lula's predecessor.

00:47 It's also significant that the first stop on this visit was Belém, a city that's close

00:54 to the mouth of the Amazon River, and also the city that will host next year's COP30

00:59 conference on combating climate change.

01:02 Both Lula and Macron have made combating climate change a top political priority, and indeed

01:08 they have pledged to raise a billion euros over the next four years to protect biodiversity.

01:14 Now despite these warm relations between the two presidents, there are also some points

01:21 of contention.

01:22 The first one is the stalled trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosul, the

01:28 equivalent of the European Union here in South America.

01:32 President Macron is worried about the effect it will have on France's agricultural industry,

01:37 and he says that French farmers are being held to much higher standards than South American

01:43 farmers as the particular agreement stands at the moment.

01:47 The other point of contention is the war in Ukraine.

01:50 The EU has imposed heavy sanctions on Russia.

01:53 However, Lula, Brazil, along with the global south generally, has refused to take sides

02:00 and has refused to impose sanctions.

02:03 However, it is an issue that President Macron would like to discuss at the upcoming G20

02:09 summit to be held later in the year in Rio de Janeiro.

02:13 Despite those divergences between the two, it's clear that the relationship between them

02:18 is much warmer than between Macron and Bolsonaro.

02:23 And it's certainly in Brazil's interest to keep those relationships close.

02:28 After all, France is the third biggest investor in Brazil, to the tune of around 35 billion

02:35 euros, a figure that Lula no doubt would like to see increase.

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