To commemorate Brazil’s Independence Day, Amb. & Madame Edmundo Sussumu Fujita held an evening garden party at the Embassy residence on Sep. 7, 2012.
2nd Vice Minister Kim Sung-han of Foreign Affairs & Trade attended the celebration to deliver the government’s congratulatory remarks and Honorary Consul Hyun Jeong-eun joined it. From the Central & South America region envoys came Amb. Manuel Lopez Trigo of Costa Rica, Amb. Martha Ortiz De Rosas of Mexico, and Amb. Hector Roberto Gonzalez Urrutia of El Salvador etc more with their spouses.

▲ Amb. & Madame Fujita (second & third from right) and Minister-Counsellor Rocha (far left) welcoming invited guests.

The following is a full speech text, delivered by His Excellency Amb. Edmundo Sussumu Fujita of Brazil on the occasion of the Brazil’s Independence Day. –Ed.

First of all, I would like to thank you for being here tonight, partaking the commemorations of the 190th. Anniversary of the Independence of Brazil and the 53rd. anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Brazil and Korea.
This year also marks the 50th. Anniversary of the departure of the first group of Korean emigrants to Brazil, who left Pusan in December 1962 and arrived in Santos in February 1963.
Today, a community of more than 50 thousand Koreans and their Brazilian descendants are living harmoniously side by side with all the other Brazilian citizens, contributing to the further development and improvement of the Brazilian society.
In fact, Brazil is like a universal motherland that receives with open arms all peoples from all continents and develops peaceful and friendly relations with all nations. Suffice it to say that Brazil has territorial limits with 10 neighbors (including France) with whom it has had no wars for more than 140 years. All questions of frontiers were settled through peaceful means, by negotiation or arbitration and one of our most respected national hero is a diplomat, the Baron of Rio Branco, who was foreign minister of Brazil from 1902 to 1912.
The open and peace-loving character of Brazil is enshrined in our Constitution, where the defense of peace and the repudiation of racism is one of the cornerstones of our foreign policy. Effectively, Brazil is a true melting pot of peoples and cultures which coexist and inter-relate in admirable way. We have the largest population of African origin outside the African continent, one of the largest Arab, Italian and Japanese communities outside their countries of origin, and sizeable other European, Asian and Latin American peoples. They are entirely free to maintain their cultures and religions, which must be respected and may even be admired by all others. But they all have one fundamental and unquestionable element in common: they are all Brazilians.
For us Brazilians, it is unthinkable that one kind of people may be considered superior or exclusive vis-à-vis another, and racism is considered an especially grave crime subject to severe retribution. Conversely, most frequently a person has a mixed ancestry, of parents and grandparents from different origins or religions and nobody is ashamed about it. Perhaps, it is this varied mixture of peoples and their interaction with the free social environment that forms the unique Brazilian phenotype. If we take our national sport, soccer or football as an illustrative model, our players are so creative and spontaneous in their dribbles that they become unpredictable to the logical and pre-organized tactical plans of the opponent. The African physical flexibility, the Latin wit, the European thoroughness and the Tropical exuberance enhance our joy of playing as much as our will to win.
The same could be said to our musicality. The harmonization of the African swing with the Portuguese melancholy and Italian romanticism, or the dissonance of the American jazz with the Latin passion contributes to enrich the international musical scene with an unmistakable repertoire, be it Samba, Bossa Nova or simply Brazilian Popular Music (MPB).
Also our food culture is “fed”, so to speak, by different influences from Africa, Native Indians, Portuguese, Italian, Arab, French, German, Japanese and others. In this regard, it is normal to see, for instance, a family of Brazilians of African descent enjoying sushi and sashimi in the same food hall where a family of Brazilians of Japanese ancestry is devouring the traditional Feijoada, our National dish. We enjoy pasta and pizza as much as kibbeh and tabouleh, and love Chilean and Argentinian wine as much as French cheese.
In fact, one could say that our culture, as reflected in our arts, sports, culinary, openness to different contents and our creativity, is like a universal bibimbap, where each ingredient has its nutritious individuality, but when mixed all together it becomes a delicious food for all seasons.
But most of all, Brazil is a country moving towards the future. Out people are full of hopes and will, with a sincere disposition to grow in harmony and peaceful cooperation with other peoples. Our foreign policy aims to be a truthful projection of our internal realities, seeking to build consensus among the diversity of interests of each nation. True to the lessons learned from the patron of the Brazilian diplomacy, we always give priority to peaceful negotiation and abhor the use of force. We always favor the application of the force of law in place of the law of force, and we believe in the strength of diplomacy instead of conducting diplomacy by strength. We believe that this is the only way to have solid peace and understanding among nations.
Korea is part of this future of Brazil. We have been having direct interaction with the Korean people and their descendents for 50 years, and today the Korean community is an integral part of the Brazilian society. They live and work hard, side by side with other fellow Brazilians, and their 2nd and 3rd generations are actively contributing to the enrichment of our economy, culture, science and technology and other fields as full Brazilians.
In more recent times, a new relationship is evolving between Brazil and Korea, as the world’s 6th and 12th largest economies. Our trade has grown threefold in this decade and the Korean investments are present in most of the important sectors of our economy. Today Korea is the 3rd largest trade partner and 2nd biggest investor from Asia, being the 6th most important overall trade partner of Brazil in 2011.
Mutual visits by high level personalities have also become frequent, since the visit of President Kim Young sam in 1996, President Roh Moo-hyun in 2004 and President Lee Myung bak in 2008.
From our side, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso paid a visit to President Kim Dae jung in Seoul in 2001 and President Lula came twice to Korea, one in 2005 and the other for the G-20 Summit. In turn, President Dilma Rousseff has been to Korea three times: in her capacity as Minister of Transports, as Chief Minister of the Civil Household of the Presidency and as President-elect of Brazil to attend the G-20 summit together with President Lula.
But I shall not bore you further with pictures of the recent past. Rather, I would like to finalize my speech with the perspectives for the future of Brazil-Korea relations. The future is in the hands of the newer generations, and our two countries are building important foundations through the exchange of students and researchers in the field of Human resources formation in the scientific and technological area.
Korea was the first Asian country to join the Brazilian program “Science without Borders” launched personally by President Dilma at the end of 2011. Under this program, about 100 thousand Brazilian students will receive Governmental scholarships in the coming four years to study at the best universities world-wide.
Next week, the first batch of 87 students will be in Korea to study at internationally renowned universities such as KAIST, Postech, Seoul National University, Yonsei, Korea and others. The program in Korea is receiving warm support, not only form the Korean government and universities, but also from important Korean enterprises. They have been generously offering opportunities for internships at their production units, in order to give the students a first-hand experience of the Korean technological advances.
By establishing strong connectivities through a network between young Brazilian and Korean students and researchers during their crucial formative years, our two countries are establishing important links for the future through a “people to people diplomacy”. This will undoubtedly be a priceless supportive channel for a long term mutually beneficial relationship between our two countries and peoples. Its strong point is in achieving synergistic results combining Brazilian creativity and adaptability to Korean determination and industriousness for innovation.
Here again Brazil is endeavoring to establish a diplomacy of knowledge in order to share knowledge through diplomacy. We are very thankful to Korea for agreeing to build this partnership towards the future, which may benefit not only our two countries but also be a paradigm for other countries.
If a long journey starts with the first step, Brazil and Korea have already taken the marching orders. And in order to feed us and energize us throughout this trip, we are planting today the seeds of the plant of learning in order to harvest tomorrow the fruits of the tree of wisdom. We are sure that through this partnership, relations between Brazil and Korea will become ever more synergistic and fertile, by linking together distant poles of the planet and making us neighbors in globalization. Ultimately, this convergence should make us even more aware of our responsibilities in helping to shrink the international asymmetries and imbalances, because we are all parts of the humankind which constitutes one and indivisible whole. And we all aim to reach a sustainable development together in a cooperative and mutually beneficial way.
I thank you all once again for being here tonight and listen patiently to my address. In particular to Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Kim Sung-han who graces us with his attendance as representative of the Korean government in this simple ceremony.