“I’m mad but I don’t eat glass,” explained Javier Milei in more than one friendly interview since being president. Just his way of justifying a dose of pragmatism that reached another peak of exposure in recent days with the G20 Leaders Summit in Brazil as the excuse.
At the symbolic level Milei finally yielded, adhering to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s “global alliance against hunger” and the final G20 statement from Rio de Janeiro where the main world powers advocated a decalogue of good economic, social and even environmental intentions. Always with reservations and explanations, while shunning the final family photo of the event as if to give some proud argument to his digital libertarian wolf-pack.
Preceded a few hours beforehand by images of the frosty greeting between President Milei and his Brazilian colleague Lula. It was the first meeting between the two after a history of unfortunate insults. But, at the same time, Economy Minister Luis ‘Toto’ Caputo was signing with a Brazilian Mining and Energy colleague an understanding to open the door to Argentina selling gas from its Vaca Muerta mega-deposits to Brazil.
Such libertarian flexibility was also ratified by Milei’s first meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, as the head of state put behind him declarations of “assassins” and “Communists” and a refusal to negotiate between states. There was a previous stepping-stone towards that flexibility when Milei described China as “a very interesting trading partner,” adding “they don’t demand anything, just that you don’t bother them.”
This presidential rewind came after China renewed the currency swaps propping up Argentina’s squalid Central Bank reserves, along with renewing its intention to keep investing in the country with an eye to the pending hydro-electric dams of Santa Cruz, mining and the reprivatisation of the Hidrovía waterway and the rail freight network. What would Donald Trump say about that?
Milei also needed to show his flexibility with Emmanuel Macron in town. The centre-right French president stopped over in Buenos Aires prior to the G20 summit. Macron visited the Santa Cruz church, infiltrated during the 1976-1983 dictatorship by the naval officer Alfredo Astiz to identify the families of the abducted and the still missing French nuns Léonie Duquet and Alice Domon. Astiz was one of those recently visited by a troop of libertarian deputies at his Ezeiza prison cell.
Argentina’s head of state also had to bite his tongue when Macron was explaining his opposition to the free-trade agreement between Mercosur and the European Union, due to the resistance of the French farming sector which fears unfair competition and aspires to not losing its protection. Ah, those Communists!
Another summit with Italian premier Giorgia Meloni then followed. Did the far-right leader explain to Milei why she did not fire or reprimand her foreign minister after Italy voted at the United Nations in favour of the United States lifting its blockade against Cuba? Or why, in contrast to Argentina, Italy did not withdraw its UN peace-keeping troops from Lebanon?
Those who frequented Néstor Kirchner’s office narrate that he used a stock phrase to banish fears when he began his presidency, explaining: “Do not listen to what I say, look at what I do.” Milei is paying a curious tribute to this maxim, and he’s not the only one.
