RUSSIAN OFFER TO BRAZIL

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28480, 9 January 1958, Page 9

RUSSIAN OFFER TO BRAZIL

“Base For Anti-U.S. Activity” W2. Press Association—CopvrwMl (Rec. 9 pan.) NEW YORK, January 7. World Communist leaders recently decided to offer Russian aid to Brazil to make it a spearhead of Latin-American hostility to the United States, the American Associated Press reported today from Rio de Janeiro.

The agency quoted a high government source as saying the Brazilian Foreign Office had prepared a secret report showing the plan was outlined at the November meeting of Communist leaden in Moscow. The report, according to the source, said: “The Foreign Office has proof—minutes of meetings held in Moscow—that a new tactic was adopted against the West whereby Brasil would serve as a spearhead for a hostile policy against the United States.”

This was interpreted as meaning the Soviet Union would launch a campaign to create political misunderstandings between the United States and Latin-American countries—with offers of aid as the opening wedge, the dispatch said. The Russians had offered oil equipment and other technical assistance to Brazil and were seeking to renew cultural and diplomatic relations, which were severed in 1947. But Brazil had seemed to be reluctant to respond to the Soviet overtures, the American Associated Press said, and, the official who revealed the report said it included this passage: "To imagine a formula where Russian tractors and petroleum equipment would not be accompanied by agents with the hammer and sickle is as difficult as searching for a needle in a haystack. "A pure and simple commercial interchange would neither harm nor profit Brazil but from a political point of view, as proven by examples in other nations, the presence of Russian diplomats can bring serious losses.

“The simplest solution, which does not interest the Russians, would be an exchange of commercial missions each time one of the two countries wants to buy or sell.

“The emissaries would come and go with a time limit for realisation of the negotiations.” The Foreign Minister, Mr Jose Carlose de Macedo Soares, had said that the President of Brazil (Mr Juscellno Kubitschek) would lay down Brazil’s policy on relations with Russia within the next few weeks, the American Associated Press report said.