Brazil teetering on axis of evil

I'd seen the news about Brazil collaborating with Iran and Turkey, and even North Korea, and here's an article in the Asia Times by Bertil Lintner, an expert on southeast Asia (via One Free Korea), giving more details:

Recent indications are that Pyongyang has sought willing trade partners outside of Asia and its new closest commercial ally appears to be Brazil. Relations between the two countries have warmed considerably since leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva became president in January 2003.

The official Chinese news agency Xinhua reported in October 2004 that North Korea planned to open an embassy in Brasilia, its fourth in the Latin and South American region after Havana, Cuba, Lima, Peru and Mexico City. On May 23, 2006, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) and the Brazilian media reported that the two countries had signed a trade agreement.

More recently, the KCNA reported last December that a “protocol on the amendment to the trade agreement” had been signed in the capital Pyongyang. “Present at the signing ceremony from the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, or North Korea] side were Ri Ryong Nam, minister of foreign trade, and officials concerned and from the Brazilian side Arnaldo Carrilho, Brazilian ambassador to the DPRK, and embassy officials,” according to the news report.

China’s role in facilitating trade between Brazil and North Korea remains a matter of conjecture, but it is significant that the state mouthpiece Xinhua has eagerly reported on the warming of relations between the two countries. China remains Pyongyang’s most important base for all kinds of foreign trade - legitimate as well as more convoluted business transactions through front companies in Beijing and elsewhere.

Brazil doesn't exactly have the same kind of civil rights afforded the United States, and that could tell why they're following in the footsteps of disaster. They may be a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.

This Front Page Mag article also mentions the Iran-Brazil relations.