Brazil Suffered Side-Effects of Sept. 11

Apart from the global economic slowdown and tightened security measures, Brazil has not been as directly affected by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001 as the United States or Europe.

"Brazil is a country where the activities of extremist groups are not relevant," said Luiz Felipe de Seixas Correa, Brazil's ambassador to Germany.

He added that his country's foreign policy regarding the Arab-Israeli conflict is very balanced and therefore "not likely to generate reactions which could potentially lead to terrorism against us."

Against terror, against the war

The ambassador stressed that the attacks and their repercussions led the Brazilian government (under former President Fernando Henrique Cardoso and current President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva) to intensify foreign policy efforts to resolve international problems with peaceful solutions.

"We immediately condemned the Sept. 11 attacks, but Brazil also condemned the 2003 American invasion of Iraq," he said. "We emphasized our position against any military action taking place without the approval of the United Nations Security Council."

Ethnic relations and anti-Americanism

Onofre dos Santos Filho, a social scientist and lecturer at the Minas Gerais Catholic University, said that extremist groups are not interested in Brazil because xenophobic sentiment has not taken root there.

"Arab ethnic groups coexist normally and harmonically with the Brazilians, without suffering from prejudice or segregation," he said.

Santos Filho also said that the Sept. 11 attacks and their consequences have caused some changes in the behavior of the Brazilians. Anti-American feelings have risen sharply, especially after the military action led by the US in Afghanistan and Iraq, he said.

Indeed, 80 percent of those polled by the Brazilian institute Ibope several months after the attacks said they were against the United States' "war on terrorism."

Concern for the Middle East

Another reaction was a greater interest in the Middle Eastern affairs, said Santos Filho, who named a recent, successful campaign by the Brazilian Catholic Bishops Conference to raise funds for the Lebanese victims of the Israeli attacks.

"Several years ago, this kind of initiative would only have come from Arab communities in Brazil," he said.

Erroneous shooting in London

In July 2005, Brazilian citizen Jean Charles de Menezes was mistaken for a suicide bomber in a London subway and shot by police seven times in the head. Seixas Correa said he sees his death as a consequence of Sept. 11.

"He was a victim of a sort of paranoia which dominated the security services of countries that suffered from terrorism and are understandably concerned about it," he said.

He said that, in the US and many European countries, this sort of paranoia can lead to making a suspect out of every person who doesn't have blond hair and blue eyes. This could potentially affect Brazilians living or traveling in those countries, since the majority of Brazil's population is non-white.