Lula wants greater relations with Southeast Asia in the hope of having a high status as a bloc

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) was invited to participate, for the second consecutive year, in the Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) leaders' summit, a bloc that Brazil is trying to convince to raise its formal status.

The appearance is part of the government's effort to have Brazil accepted as a "full dialogue partner" of Asean and stop being just a "sectoral dialogue partner", a request that was formalized in January this year.

In the current status, Brazil and the bloc's members have exchanges in specific areas under the umbrella of the three pillars of Asean, which are political-security, economic and socio-cultural. In full status, on the other hand, cooperation occurs with more access and in a broader and deeper way.

Members of the management told Folha, however, that there is no expectation that the acceptance will be announced at the meeting in the coming days, only next year, when Singapore assumes the bloc's presidency.

Lula arrived in Manila, in the Philippines, in the early hours of Friday (13), Brasília time, after passing through Turkey to participate in COP31, the UN conference on climate change. On Monday (16), he will also visit Spain, to meet with Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

In the Philippines, in addition to participating in the Asean summit, where he will give a speech at the opening, Lula will have bilateral meetings with Canada and Singapore.

Lula was invited by the Philippine president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., to participate in the meeting, which takes place from Sunday (15) to Tuesday (17). The invitation was made during the visit of the Philippine Chancellor, Maria Theresa Lazaro, to Palácio da Alvorada in August.

The Asian country is the current president of Asean. Today only Australia, Canada, China, the European Union, India, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom and Turkey have this status as full dialogue partners before the bloc.

To be accepted, Brazil needs the approval of all members of the group, which are currently Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Timor-Leste and Vietnam.

In August, during an event celebrating Asean's anniversary in Brasília, the bloc's secretary general, Kao Kim Hourn, stated that all member countries have already approved the complete evaluation of Brazil's request for elevated status.

According to Joanne Lin, coordinator of the Asean Study Center, the change of category means, in practice, having access to the annual meeting of foreign ministers, in addition to the possibility of opening high-level channels for communication in different areas, such as trade and investment, transport, finance, education, combating crime and health.

"In addition to expanding the scope of engagement, the status of full dialogue partner would give Brazil more institutionalized channels to deepen practical cooperation with Asean and strengthen its political and economic presence in Southeast Asia", he says. "But the depth of this partnership will ultimately depend on how much both sides actually take advantage of these opportunities."

The expert states that the new status does not, however, guarantee annual access to the summit and that Brazil's participation would still be conditional on the invitation of the country that holds the current presidency.

One of the government's main objectives with its rapprochement with the bloc's countries is the diversification of markets for the export of Brazilian products, a movement that intensified with the tariffs imposed by the president of the United States, Donald Trump, in 2025.

Tariffs were also one of the main reasons for the PT's participation in last year's summit, in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, where he met with the American and began negotiations to reduce tax rates. There is no forecast for a bilateral meeting between the leaders at this year's meeting.

Despite the government's efforts, becoming a full dialogue partner with Asean does not automatically translate into more access to markets, but it allows for dialogue with authorities that can facilitate negotiations.

"Closer institutional engagement with Asean could provide additional opportunities to address trade concerns, facilitate regulatory cooperation and explore new business opportunities," says Lin.