Marcelo Rech

A bit more than three months ago, the Republic of Georgia opened its embassy in Brasilia with the goal of turning Brazil into a platform for its political projection in the Latin America.

In the beginning of August, the Brazilian Senate approved the indication of the first Brazilian ambassador in Tbilisi.

The decision demands to the policy of the Ministry of Foreign Relations of opening the maximum of representations world out, including the countries with which we have no possibility of trade at all.

Each representation implies, in the imagination of the Brazilian diplomacy, one vote in the General-Assembly of the United Nations, which, one day, nobody knows when, will decide if Brazil will have or not a permanent seat in its Security Council.

Member of the BRICs together with Russia, India, China and South Africa, Brazil won´t have with Georgia a narrow relation.

Even so, Carlos Alberto Lopes Asfora, who will lead the representation of Brazil in that country, sees many possibilities, as soon as more than 50 percent of the Georgian population lives on the agriculture, sector that, on the other hand, is responsible for only 5 percent of the local GNP.

He believes that Brazil can do in Georgia what intends to do in Africa with the expertise of the EMBRAPA.

Georgia is an European country located on the edges of the Black River and that was a part of the Soviet Union. In 2008, a territorial dispute involved the country in a war with Russia.

For Brazil, to keep a deep relation with Georgia implicates in accepting damages to its relations with Russia, which is not much probable.

Georgia also wants to buy armaments and to secure an agreement of cooperation in Defense with Brazil.

With this purpose, the Minister of the Foreign Business of Georgia, Grigol Vashadze, disembarked in Brasilia on August 25. It was the first time that a Georgian chancellor visited Brazil.

In the opportunity, there were examined the current stage of the bilateral relationship – Georgia conquered its independence two decades ago - and were signed agreements of exemption of visas in common and diplomatic passports and in technical cooperation, besides the establishment of mechanism of political consultations between the two countries.

According to the Itamaraty, the commercial exchange between Brazil and Georgia reached US$ 107 millions in 2010. The Georgian exports are concentrated in manure and fertilizers. Brazil is the 12th largest exporter to Georgia, with a list that includes sugars, meats and chemical products.

For the two governments, the visit of the Georgian chancellor represents the starting point for the establishment of most wide commercial relations, with the interest of that country in sending, soon, business missions to Brazil, which, on the other hand, will be able to deepen the knots with a key-country of the southern Caucasus.

But everything depends on how Moscow sees such movements.

Brazil, in turn, follows closely the evolution of the tensions between Georgia and Russia.

One of the preoccupations concerns to the use of the Georgian territory by terrorist organizations and the organized crime.

Recently, the director of the FSB (the Russian agency of intelligence), Alexander Bortnikov, affirmed that leaders of several groups, including terrorists, work to penetrate the Northern Caucasus through Georgia.

According to him, among the organizations already identified by Russia, there are the Al-Qaeda, the Hizb ut-Tahrir, the Islamic Party of the Turkestan, the Muslim Brotherhood, and extremist movements like the Tablighi Jamaat and the Al Takfir Wal Hijra.

Important to notice that even with the elimination of "iconic figures", terrorist groups remain active, quickly adapting to new conditions, perfecting their tactics and skills and accessing the last scientific and technological advancements in means of armaments.

A few weeks ago, a group with nearly 70 integrants entered a region known as Pankisi Gorge, in Georgia, to receive terrorist training.

This situation already was denounced by the Russian secret services, since these people would be being trained to perform an attack on Russia.

One of the terrorists most searched by the Russians, Doku Umarov, is hidden in the village Omalo, of the District Akhmeta, in Kakheti, Georgia, but local authorities ignore the information.

Russia had already declared that in the attacks to the subway of Moscow, in March, there was a “Georgian trace”. For Moscow, the leader Mikhail Saakashvili is unpredictable and can be considered as a “loose cannon”.

In November of 2010, the president of the Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, also accused Georgian authorities of covering Chechen terrorists responsible for attacks in that country.

As it is possible to see, the political framework in the region doesn´t seem friendly at all.

Would Brazil be willing to create a problem with Russia, one of the largest importers of Brazilian meat and strategic partner in several themes of the international agenda?

Marcelo Rech is a journalist, editor of the InfoRel and specialist in International Relations, Strategies & Policies of Defense and Terrorism & Counter-Insurgency. E-mail: inforel@inforel.org