Irritable Brazil Syndrome

I’ll do my best to explain the very likely reason for this, its the Brazilian First Lady TikTok controversy during the last meeting aka “the Janja(her nickname) controversy” is 90% of the reason, Xi isn’t risking going through that again until I’m betting after Brazil’s election next year at least.

For context this is relevant as Brazil has been making several pro-US moves and an attempt to “regulate” social media including Tik Tok obviously includes many angles one of them being obviously the image of the similar move by the US which felt obviously offensive to China.

You can translate what she says but its liberal nonsense about social media harming kids and favoring right wing discourse, which is funny because she should be up in arms against Trump and Facebook(Whatsapp is the biggest social media in BR) not fucking TikTok anyway. Now you go and see if the global south are about to talk down to Trump or even Biden in the same manner.

In any case there was also an Tiktok incident earlier with a child that died from one of those Tiktok challenges.

Here is the timeline for the record, there is 4 parts to this story.:

1- She interrupted the meeting to complain to Xi about Tik Tok and ask the CPC to send a “representative” to help legislate and control social media. This was leaked to the press and seen as a huge diplomatic faux pas. Janja’s Comment About TikTok Causes Tension During Lula-Xi Meeting

Folha confirmed with two sources —one from the Brazilian delegation in Beijing and another close to the Chinese side— that Janja’s intervention caused discomfort among the Chinese.

2- In a press conference the following day Lula is visibly angry with reporters brings out some nonsense excuse that she was talking on his behalf.

“I asked comrade Xi Jinping if it was possible for him to send a person of trust to us to discuss the digital issue – especially TikTok,” Lula told reporters in Beijing on Wednesday.

This is obviously saving face nonsense, this was a business meeting, Lula is not really technologically literate, nobody knew this was a topic to be discussed(decided in advance obvs), there is zero chance Lula would interrupt to talk about something randomly like this. Imagine being like “yeah so railroads are good but btw can you send me someone so we see how to best ban TikTok” sounds exactly as batshit random as you imagine.

3- It is also reported he was incredibly angry during the plane trip back and reprimanded the delegation. Poder360(ptbr)

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) scolded his ministers during his flight back to Brazil. The reason was the leak to the press of statements attributed to First Lady Janja Lula da Silva about the social network TikTok in a meeting with the President of China, Xi Jinping, on Tuesday (13.May.2025), in Beijing.

Lula defended his wife and stated that the case was inadmissible. The PT member told the ministers that the episode represents a breach of loyalty on the part of his team, but avoided naming government members. He stated that he would not conduct a search operation. The information was published by the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo and confirmed by Poder360.

4- A few days later, Lula’s obvious saving face narrative was finaly completely undermined by Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Viera who denies the “CPC technical expert-representative” part of the narrative.

Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira said on Tuesday (20) that the Brazilian government has not made any formal invitation for experts or representatives of the Chinese social network TikTok to come to Brazil to discuss the regulation of the platform.

Things eventualy calmed down and new controversies appeared, but in Brazil there were people on both sides trying to defend the First Lady while some just felt it was not appropriate and Lula comes out as an idiot anyway caught with his pants lying even if understandable. Many feel it was not appropriate as she is obviously not in an elected position.

This was a relatively big controversy despite the overall positive meeting.

When China says “previous meetings” this is undoubtedly part of the reason. Remember Xi doesn’t like leaks to the press(e.g Tradeu 2022) and while it isn’t necessarily harmful to China in anyway, China values respect as their first principle for diplomacy and this was obviously very disrespectful e.g it reinforced the CPC as the “owner” of Tiktok etc.

There is argument that Xi wouldn’t be there just to meet Lula again though so its just another point on how BRICS fickle is incredibly pointless beyond being a trade showroom anyway.

The South China Morning Post reported that the fact that the Chinese president had met Lula twice in less than a year contributed to the decision.

The Brazilian Supreme Court already granted Putin a legal exception, so he could visit Brazil if he really wanted that.