The presidents of Brazil and Mexico have spoken out against the interference of other countries in domestic policies, amidst disagreements between the two leaders and the United States, which they previously accused of such practices.
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Claudia Sheinbaum “reaffirmed the importance and value they attach to strengthening and preserving multilateralism, international law, democracy, and the principle of non-interference, particularly in today’s complex global context,” reads a statement released Wednesday by the Brazilian Presidency.
The statement summarizes the topics discussed by the leaders of Latin America’s two most populous nations during a 40-minute videoconference held on Wednesday. Lula and Sheinbaum also criticized external interference in Cuba, confirming their stance in favor of ending the embargo and sharing concerns over the severe humanitarian situation in the Caribbean country.
The joint criticisms of external interference emerge a week after the Brazilian Government, in an official statement, attributed to an “attempted interference” the US Government’s decision to propose additional tariffs on imports from Brazil due to alleged unfair trade practices.
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The proposal for new sanctions was made after the US Department of Commerce concluded an investigation into issues such as forced labor in Brazil, deforestation, the automatic payment system, and even agreements with Mexico and India deemed unfavorable to the US.
“This investigation began in July 2025 at the instigation of the Bolsonaro family [of opposition presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro] and is associated with the attempt to interfere in our country’s internal affairs,” stated a note from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, implying the sanctions also have electoral motivations.
Similarly, Sheinbaum denounced ten days ago an attempted interference by the United States in her country’s politics due to the indictment of a Mexican governor and an unauthorized CIA operation in Mexico, in which two US agents died.
It was a reaction to the decision of the New York Prosecutor’s Office to request the arrest and extradition of the governor of Sinaloa, Rubén Rocha, a member of the ruling Morena party accused of ties to a drug cartel.
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“When it is dictated from abroad who is guilty and who is not, when they seek to pressure our institutions from the outside, when the idea that another country can intervene in matters that only concern Mexicans is normalized, we are no longer talking about cooperation, we are talking about interference,” the Mexican President stated.
During the videoconference, Lula and Sheinbaum analyzed the progress in cooperation commitments and political dialogue undertaken by both governments in recent months.
Among these advancements, they cited the energy cooperation agenda, which ranges from collaboration in biofuel production to the negotiation of an agreement between the two state oil companies—Pemex and Petrobras—for deepwater hydrocarbon exploration.
“They also agreed to deepen conversations that will allow reviewing and updating the bilateral commercial legal framework,” the official note further detailed. With the objective of accelerating this rapprochement, both leaders requested their foreign ministers to schedule, as soon as possible, a new meeting of the Mexico-Brazil Binational Commission, the main bilateral mechanism for dialogue and cooperation.
