Rumsfeld held talks with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Minister of Defense Jose Alencar.

"Our two countries are looking (for) ways to work together more closely to confront the anti-social threats by organised crime, by gangs, drug-traffickers, hostage-takers and terrorists," the Pentagon chief said after the meeting.

Rumsfeld also lauded Brazil's leadership in building the coalition of Latin American troops which form the core of a United Nations peacekeeping force in violence-wracked Haiti.

"Brazil can be proud of the leadership it is exercising in the region and several parts of the world," he said. "It is a welcome contribution to stability in our hemisphere."

During his meeting with Rumsfeld, Lula said Brazil was making "every effort toward a more stable, integrated and economically prosper Latin America," according to government sources.

Alencar meanwhile said his meeting with Rumsfeld "reinforced the already excellent relations between Brazil and the United States," the sources added.

Rumsfeld, who is on a tour of Latin America this week and will head next to Guatemala, spoke before departing north for Manaus to visit the offices of SIVAM, the US-supported radar- and satellite-based system of surveillance for the Amazon basin region.

Aside from environmental protection, the system is useful in monitoring aircraft flights that could be involved in drug trafficking.

"I call it probably the most ambitious technological undertaking in South America," said a senior Pentagon official who to remain anonymous. "It'll help Brazil assert effective sovereignty over its entire territory, airspace and so on," the official said.

"One of the chief concerns we have is the problem of dealing with flights by illegal actors: terrorists, drug traffickers, arm smugglers, you name it," the official said, adding that five years ago "nobody knew what was going above" the enormous Amazon basin region.

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