October 15, 2007 (LPAC)--Emilio Botin, head of the Royal Bank of Scotland's Spanish partner, Santander Bank, is scheduled to visit Brazil this week, during which he is expected to announce details of the $27 billion in new investments which he recently promised President Lula de Silva his bank would be making in Brazil over the next few years, Gazeta do Povo reported October 11, 2007.

The Franco-ite Botin is being deployed personally by London to Brazil to try to sink the project to found a Bank of the South as a regional financial institution controlled by the sovereign governments of South America, independent of private financier interests. Santander Bank, Spain's largest bank, and the number-one foreign bank across Ibero-America, has imposed its agents in key positions within the Lula government, and has deployed them repeatedly to sabotage the South American project, which the Lula government is part of.

For example, Development, Industry and Foreign Trade Minister Miguel Jorge, a former Vice President of Santander Bank in Brazil, stated adamantly on Oct. 9 that Brazil's giant National Economic and Social Development Bank (BNDES) will not put up any money for the Bank of the South.

The BNDES, a state bank, which has served in the past as a key vehicle for Brazil's participation in regional integration projects, is formally part of the Development Ministry, which Santander's Jorge now heads.

Seventeen of Santander's promised $27 billion will go for Santander's purchase of Brazil's Banco Real, which Santander intends to gobble up as part of its buy-out of the Dutch ABN-Amro giant, which Santander, the British monarchy's own Royal Bank of Scotland, and Fortis Bank hope to purchase next month for a cool $93 billion--if they can come up with the cash. If that purchase goes through, Santander will become the third largest bank in Brazil.