25-09-03 Both presidents assumed power seemingly against the odds with promises of sweeping social reforms. One is a former shoeshine boy and union leader whose election victory in Brazil last year made him the first leftist president in Latin America's largest country. The other is an icon of the left who maintains a tight grip on power despite the efforts of 10 US presidents.
But while Cuban leader Fidel Castro is increasingly isolated, Brazil's Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has proven a deft statesman able to play to different crowds. Experts say that ability will come in handy when he arrives in Havana for a 24-hour visit with long-time friend, Castro.

While the official Cuban media has touted da Silva's visit as an opportunity to expand "solidarity" and commercial ties with Brazil, a Latin American powerhouse, the State Department and opposition leaders are hoping he will intercede on behalf of the 75 dissidents who were jailed in a crackdown this spring and meet with opposition groups. The visit will likely prove a domestic win for both da Silva and Castro, said Larry Birns director of the Washington-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs.
"The Lula trip is a balancing act," Birns said. "I think Lula is benefited by reaffirming the authenticity of his leftist credentials at very little cost because the economic powers are going to discount this as merely flying the flag for sentimental reasons," he said. "In the case of Castro it's about being re-legitimised by Latin America's largest, most important country. ... There are going to be credits that come out of it for Cuba and an important symbolic gesture."

"He (da Silva) is mainly there to tend to his home audience," said Dan Erikson, head of the Cuba program at the Inter-American Dialogue. "The context of his visit is coming from a regional power independent of the United States and seeking to increase hemispheric integration, and not from a country that is trying to visit Cuba to build up its human rights (credentials)."
Da Silva, who has two private meetings and a dinner scheduled with Castro, will lead a delegation of about 100 high level cabinet members and business executives, including his chief of staff, Jose Dirceu, who was exiled to Cuba under Brazil's military dictatorship.

Perhaps wary of a backlash at a time when many governments have criticized Cuba's rights record, a Brazilian diplomat in Havana described the visit as largely a commercial venture, even comparing it to trips by American farm state representatives courting the Cuban market. The governor of Illinois has been here," said a Brazilian diplomat.
"We have the same view, a constructive view. We are here to sign some agreements, to explore possibilities for exchange," the diplomat added. "We have no crusade for or against Cuba. We try to have good relations with everyone without interfering in internal affairs."

The diplomat described potential cooperation agreements such as:
-- Deep-water oil exploration by Brazilian state oil giant Petrobras for reserves in the Gulf of Mexico. Spain's Repsol-YPF partnered with the Cuban government for seismic studies in 2001.
-- Increased imports of Cuban vaccines such as the Hepatitis B drug, Interferon.
-- Partnering with Cuban firm, GranCaribe, to build a 2,000-room hotel complex.
-- Increase exchanges between Brazilian and Cuban athletic coaches.
-- Investing $ 30 mm in revamping one of Cuba's nickel processing plants and also providing funds to renovate some of Cuba's sugar mills to produce sugar by-products such as alcohol. Almost half the island's outdated mills closed last year due to rock bottom prices and low productivity.

While Cuba looks to da Silva to increase commercial ties, the State Department wants him to nudge Castro on human rights.
"We're hoping President Lula will raise the obvious concerns about human rights in Cuba. We've made that point to the government of Brazil," said a State Department official.
Still, despite some conservatives' initial fears of a leftist alliance between da Silva, Castro and embattled Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, the official said Cold War enmities with Cuba will not get in the way of ties with Brazil.
"The bilateral relationship with Brazil is a very strong one and the simple fact of Lula going to Cuba doesn't threaten that," he said.

Though a meeting with dissidents is not on da Silva's schedule and Brazilian diplomats said it will not take place, Blanca Reyes, wife of renowned poet and independent journalist Raul Rivero, who was sentenced to 20 years in jail, said she still hopes he will be sympathetic to her cause.
"I want him to intercede on behalf of my husband and the other 74 (jailed dissidents)," said Reyes, one of several wives who dropped off letters at the Brazilian embassy seeking da Silva's intervention. "I don't know much about politics, but if he is an honest man, as I've heard he is, and a man who comes from Brazil's working class, why not"?