RIO DE JANEIRO — Seeking an opening during the World Cup soccer tournament to thaw relations with Brazil, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. arrived in Latin America’s largest country on Monday, expressing a desire to “rebuild trust” after the souring of ties over revelations of the National Security Agency’s surveillance practices.
While Mr. Biden ostensibly traveled to Natal in northeast Brazil to watch the United States play against Ghana, he made it clear ahead of a meeting on Tuesday with Brazil’s president, Dilma Rousseff, that the Obama administration was hoping to discuss a range of issues including trade and efforts to lure more Brazilians to study in American universities.
While Ms. Rousseff had shown indignation last year after news reports revealed that the N.S.A. had spied on her and her top aides, pushing her to postpone a state visit to Washington, she said in an interview in Brasília this month that she was also prepared to repair ties with the United States.
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“I think the conditions have matured,” said Ms. Rousseff, 66, emphasizing that she still felt it was “extremely lamentable” for the N.S.A. surveillance to have occurred. Still, she said, pointing to resilient trade ties: “From Brazil’s point of view, the relationship with the United States is a strategic one. We’re the two largest democracies in the hemisphere.”
For both countries, the stars may be aligning for repairing ties after nearly a year in which the relationship had stalled. As Iraq is roiled by the advances of Sunni rebel extremists and relations with Russia remain tense over the intervention in Ukraine, rekindling bonds with Brazil gives Washington a chance to raise its diplomatic profile in Latin America during the World Cup.
And for Ms. Rousseff, warming again to the United States, which is Brazil’s second-largest trading partner after China, enables her to burnish foreign policy credentials in advance of presidential elections in October as rivals criticize her administration’s close ties with leftist governments in nations including Venezuela and Cuba.
Curiously, Ms. Rousseff, a former Marxist guerrilla who has evolved into a moderate leftist, and Mr. Biden, a foreign policy authority in the Senate before becoming vice president, appear to have developed a strong rapport. At a dinner in Brasília this month with foreign correspondents, a relaxed Ms. Rousseff jokingly called Mr. Biden “very seductive.”
However, both Brasília and Washington still seem to be approaching their strained ties with caution.
In an interview published on Monday by the Brazilian newspaper Folha de S. Paulo, Mr. Biden said that the invitation for Ms. Rousseff to attend a state dinner still stands, but he did not say whether the Obama administration would issue an apology for the N.S.A. spying, as Ms. Rousseff had requested.
Instead, Mr. Biden emphasized the deep trade ties between the two countries, pointing to the examples of American companies like Anheuser-Busch and Burger King, which have come under Brazilian ownership, and American companies like Ford and General Motors with huge Brazilian subsidiaries.
“Brazil cannot and should not be isolated,” Mr. Biden said. “That would go against our national interests, as well as the interests of the rest of the countries of the hemisphere.”
As Brazil projects more influence in Latin America, partly through newintergovernmental unions that exclude the United States, the visit by Mr. Biden also gives Washington a chance to build support here for next year’s Summit of the Americas, a gathering of regional leaders organized by the Organization of American States, which has its headquarters in Washington.
“They’re in the middle of the head count and want Brazil in,” said Julia E. Sweig, director for Latin American studies at the Council of Foreign Relations, while pointing out that neither country appeared ready to surprise their own constituencies or bureaucracies with major initiatives. “You can think of Biden as the whip.”
While warm words are expected on both sides, some Brazilian analysts warned that expectations should remain low for Mr. Biden’s visit as mistrust persists in Brasília over a range of United States policies, from the trade embargo against Cuba to efforts aimed at lowering trade barriers on Washington’s terms.
“We probably won’t see big steps straight away,” said Geraldo Zahran, a specialist on Brazil’s ties to the United States at Pontifical Catholic University in São Paulo, citing the hesitance for big policy shifts before Brazil’s presidential elections. “But there’s a recognition that people are ready and willing to move on.”
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