Iran pushing trade with Latin America

As if his overtures within the Muslim world weren’t unsettling enough, Ahmadinejad is coming to our half of the earth again to stir the pot.  This time he’s trying to promote uranium extraction with Venezuela and “business” with Brazil (including sharia banking no doubt).  From the LA Times this morning:

In Brazil, Ahmadinejad and Lula are expected to sign cooperation agreements in biotechnology, energy and agriculture. An Iranian deputy foreign minister told the official Brazilian news agency last month that Tehran hopes to expand trade with Brazil to $15 billion from $2 billion in the petrochemical, energy, agricultural and medical fields.

About 200 Iranian businessmen are traveling with Ahmadinejad, who is scheduled to address the Brazilian Congress and speak to students in Brasilia.

Venezuela’s ambassador to Tehran announced this month that new uranium deposits had been discovered in Venezuela and that his country and Iran “are now cooperating on a research and development project,” the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

“At this juncture, Iran and Venezuela have no nuclear cooperation,” said David Velasquez Caraballo, the envoy. “But in the future, such cooperation might be established.”

These trade initiatives could end up facilitating Iran’s nuclear program.

Does anybody else miss the Monroe Doctrine?