Why Latin America remains neutral on Russia-Ukraine conflict

While many Western countries have isolated Russia with sanctions and by supplying weapons to Ukraine, a large part of Latin America has taken a different approach to the conflict.

That’s partly due to the US history in the region where countries like Cuba and Mexico have experienced American political and military interventions in the past. Two decades ago, the global audience including Latin America also witnessed the US invasion of Iraq in a violation of international law.

Brazil, the Latin American economic powerhouse and a member of BRICS, a non-Western political bloc, has instead offered to mediate between Russia and Ukraine.

Eugene Chausovsky, a defence expert and a senior analyst at New Lines Institute, says that Latin America largely represents a “‘Global South’ position” which is “neither overtly pro-Western nor pro-Russian when it comes to the war in Ukraine.”

Latin America sees itself as part of the Global South, a group of low and middle-income countries, which have experienced the horrors of Western colonisation.

In the 1950s, some Global South states like India, Indonesia and Ghana were instrumental in launching the Non-Aligned Movement to stay neutral on the Cold War’s opposing sides.

Brazil’s leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has criticised the US for arming Ukraine, something that’s prolonging the conflict, according to him. Brazil alongside India and Indonesia, has offered its role as a mediator.

‘No, not another Cold War’

Most Latin Americans, like their peers in the Global South, see the Ukraine conflict morphing into a new Cold War, says Chausovsky. During the decades-long Cold War, Latin America experienced several right-wing coups that were backed by the US. Socialist governments with ties to the Soviet-led communist bloc were unacceptable to Washington..

Groupings like BRICS have more appeal for the Latin American countries. Argentina recently joined BRICS as part of an enlargement plan along with Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

“Brazil has increased its engagement with Russia via the BRICS platform, while it has also offered itself as a neutral mediator in the Ukrainian conflict,” Chausovsky tells TRT World.

Some analysts see BRICS as a new embodiment of the Global South’s non-aligned movement. But things are different this time as countries are aligning with multiple powerhouses instead of opting for complete non-alignment, according to experts.

Russia is “much more important” to Argentina and Brazil, the two members of the BRICS, says Kamran Gasanov, a political analyst at Russian International Affairs Council, a Moscow-based think-tank. “But in the issue of conflict resolution they do not prioritise Russia and take into account the interests of Ukraine too.”

While Latin American states except Nicaragua, a staunch Russian ally, opposed Russian annexation of Ukrainian territories, they have not joined Western sanctions against Moscow.

“The region, in general terms, has maintained a neutral and equidistant stance, reluctant to firmly take sides and constantly urging the belligerent Russia and Ukraine to resume diplomatic dialogue to solve the conflict,” says Juan Martin Gonzalez Cabañas, a researcher at Moscow State Linguistic University (MSLU) and a Eurasia specialist at the Argentine-based Center of Studies "Soberanía".

Ties with Russia

Compared to the rest of the Global South — from India to the Gulf states to much of Africa — which have maintained strong economic ties with Moscow despite not being a clear supporter of the Russian position, Latin America’s trade with Russia is minuscule. But economic interests can deepen, experts say.

“Russia is interested in an independent Latin America,” which should have the right “to choose their own political and economic partners without US pressure,” says Gasanov. Moscow is interested in expanding cooperation with Latin America in economic, trade and investment areas, the Russian analyst tells TRT World.

Russia, one of the world’s top five oil producers, has increased its ties with Latin America through joint oil projects. “Russian oil companies operate in Venezuela and develop projects in Argentina, Brazil and other countries,” Gasanov says.

In the wake of the Ukraine conflict, Russia-Venezuela ties have worried the US policymakers. Washington sent a diplomatic delegation to Caracas to seek reconciliation with the anti-US Nicolas Maduro government.

The US rapprochement with Caracas aims to increase Venezuelan oil production in a bid to dent Russia’s earnings from the sale of oil in the international market.

Russia has also developed military ties with Venezuela, deploying two nuclear-capable bombers in the country five years ago. There were also some speculations on Russian mercenary group Wagner’s presence in Venezuela in the name of defending the Maduro government against any threats.

“According to the newspaper El Mundo, the Wagnerians helped Maduro in Operation Shark to search for and capture the insurgent military who landed on the coast of the country,” says Gasanov, referring to a US-linked failed attempt to oust the Maduro government in 2020. “But there is no exact information that the Russian military belonged to Wagner,” he adds.

Cabanas, the Argentinian political scientist, finds Wagner’s presence across Latin America “as sporadic and occasional unlike the rest of the world.”

Last week there were also revelations that Russians have recruited Cuban “citizens” to fight for the war in Ukraine. Cuba, a communist state, was an ally of the Soviet Union, the predecessor state to the Russian Federation. But the Cuban foreign ministry declared its clear opposition to “the aim of recruiting Cuban citizens to bear arms in any country."

Ukraine and Latin American left

The Latin American left, which had strong ties with the Soviet Union has long been wary of the US intervention in the region and sees Washington-backed coups as an attack on the sovereignty of their countries. But on the Russian offensive in Ukraine, “the left in the region doesn't hold a unified position”, according to Cabanas.

“It encompasses a wide range of views, including diametrically opposed stances: from the Sandinista government in Nicaragua, which rhetorically supports the Russian military action, to the government of Boric in Chile, who publicly condemned and denounced the Russian decision,” Cabanas tells TRT World.

The Sandinistas, a left-wing movement, fought against the US occupation of Nicaragua in the 1930s. Gabriel Boric, who is of Croatian descent, is Chile’s left-wing president elected last year, originally coming from a far-left platform called Social Convergence group.