Belize and 31 other states look to new regional integration bloc
Posted: 26/02/2010 - 09:12 AM
Author: Adele Ramos - adelescribe@gmail.com
Belize was among the 32 nations that met this week for the two-day Unity Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean—held immediately following the 1st Mexico–CARICOM Summit—which was held from Sunday, February 21, to Tuesday, February 23, 2010, at Playa del Carmen, Cancun, Mexico.
The biggest news coming out of the summit is that the countries, with the exception of Honduras, which was not invited due to loss of recognition following last year’s presidential coup d’état, agreed to form a hemispheric organization, supposedly as an alternative to the Organization of American States (OAS). That organization is provisionally dubbed “the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States.”
They reportedly voted for the creation of a new regional integration bloc, minus the US and Canada. Some pundits say that the move is in defiance of Washington, which is deemed the dominant organization in the OAS.
Just as they did at the first such hemispheric summit of The Rio Group in Brazil in December 2008, the 32 leaders of the Americas continue to pursue their agenda of political, economic, social and cultural integration of all the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean.
The second paragraph of the Cancun Declaration, issued at the conclusion of the meeting and sourced from a Venezuelan government website, said that the leaders attending the summit agreed to build a common space with the intention of expanding regional integration on the political, economic, social and cultural fronts.
They furthermore continue to speak of a common currency and a common economic space for the Latin American and Caribbean region, as they reaffirmed plans to continue the “evaluation of existing experiences in the field of common currencies.”
Belize is a member of two regional groups that were represented at the Cancun summit: The Central American Integration System (SICA) and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), which are both seeking similar integration agendas; albeit on smaller scales.
The countries furthermore approved an additional $25 million in aid for Haiti, on top of what has already been donated in advance of the summit in Mexico.
“This summit provides an excellent opportunity to demonstrate our regional identity and the convergence of our countries’ aims and aspirations,” said the Mexico-CARICOM summit declaration, released on Sunday, February 21, just ahead of the hemispheric meeting.
Some leaders still believe that the OAS should continue as a hemispheric organization of American states. Evo Morales, president of Bolivia, said that Colombia’s president Alvaro Uribe did not want the new organization to succeed, and he accused him of arriving at the summit at the last minute, just for photos and lunch.
Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Hon. Dean Barrow represented Belize along with his delegation, which included his Chief Executive Officer Audrey Wallace, as well as the CEO of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Alexis Rosado, and Belize’s Ambassador to Mexico Rosendo Urbina.
Belize is an active member of the OAS, but neither Honduras nor Cuba is. Cuba was suspended from the OAS on June 3, 2009, but a 2009 resolution at a regional meeting in Honduras left the door open for Cuba’s voluntary, but conditional return.
Ironically, the OAS suspended Honduras on July 5, 2009, following a coup d’état that expelled then President José Manuel Zelaya from office.
Cuba was excluded from the 2009 Summit of the Americas held in Trinidad and Tobago; however, it was represented at the recent unity summit in Mexico.
Raul Castro said at the Unity Summit that “Cuba considers that the conditions are present to rapidly advance toward the constitution of a regional organization purely for Latin America and Caribbean, comprising and representing the 33 independent nations of Latin America and the Caribbean.”
He added, “Our aspiration is that the constitutional document of the new body will be formulated quickly and efficiently, in order to have it approved at the next Summit [in Venezuela].”
With the global financial crisis raging in full force in 2009, money was a big issue at the preceding Summit of the Americas, and small states appealed to US President Barack Obama to help them lobby the countries of the industrialized world for aid, which has still not materialized.
At the Mexico summit, Belize Prime Minister Barrow made his appeal to the Mexican president, in the same vein.
In his closing remarks, Barrow asked Mexican president Felipe de Jesus Calderon Hinojosa to act, in his country’s capacity as a non-borrowing member country of the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), to give support to the bank in its effort to have a general capital increase, a Belize Government release informed.
“The management of the CDB has identified an increased need for financial resources on the part of its borrowing member countries in light of the adverse international economic environment and the fact that these countries have very limited options for accessing additional investment funds from the international financial community,” GOB said. ”The bank, therefore, has indicated that its capital base will need to be expanded to accommodate the needs of its borrowing member countries.” Calderon pledged to consider the request.
Barrow also asked Calderon about the G-20’s commitment to help small states counteract climate change.
The Summit of the Americas in Port of Spain, Trinidad, failed to achieve unity in the Americas. South American nations were angry over Cuba’s exclusion from the Summit, and there were schisms over economic and trade policies, with the old debate of socialism versus capitalism taking the limelight as soon as that summit began.
The negotiations leading up to the adoption of the Port of Spain declaration were complicated by the fact that just before the Summit, the countries of the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas (ALBA), and especially Venezuela, Bolivia, and Nicaragua, had agreed to reject that declaration.
There were a series of declarations coming out of this week’s Cancun meetings, including a declaration on climate change signed between Mexico and CARICOM, and the 88-point Cancun Declaration coming at its close.
The region’s leaders got to hear from Haiti’s president Rene Preval in the wake of the recent earthquake on January 12, 2010, which left 1.5 million homeless.
At the end of the Mexico-CARICOM summit, the leaders formulated the Haiti Declaration, confirming “solidarity with the government and people of Haiti.” Four commitments enshrined in the Haiti declaration are:
(1) Mexico and CARICOM will jointly review and harmonize our cooperation plans and programs to take advantage of our joint capacities to provide aid and assistance for the reconstruction of Haiti in the medium and long term according to the needs, interests and priorities of the Haitian government and in conjunction with existing aid efforts at the regional and international levels.
(2) Mexico and CARICOM will assign the highest joint priority to strengthening our efforts at aid and reconstruction, particularly as regards health, in the emergency and post-emergency stage, on the understanding that this sector is a priority for Haiti’s economic and social development.
(3) Mexico will contribute with the recently-created CARICOM-Haiti Support Unit and the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Agency (CDEMA) in the design of a regional strategy for dealing with crisis situations due to natural disasters.
(4) Mexico and the CARICOM member states, to the extent of their respective capacities and with a sense of urgency, will provide support in the form of tents and shelters for the Haitian population affected by the earthquake.
Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Patrick Manning promised relief of US$5 million to Haiti.
The 18-point declaration drawn up at the end of the 1st Summit of Mexico and CARICOM, dated February 22, 2010, said, “In order to increase economic relations between Mexico and CARICOM, we agreed to organize an economic seminar during the second half of this year, organized by CARICOM, to identify business niches and investment opportunities for our countries.”
The countries also endorsed the Mexico-CARICOM Technical Cooperation Program and pledged to explore the financial mechanisms for supporting implementation, including the establishment of a financial Mexico-CARICOM cooperation fund.
The leaders agreed to hold the Second Mexico-CARICOM Summit in 2012 in Barbados, while the next Latin America-Mexico summit is due to be held in Venezuela in 2011 and in Chile in 2012.
In speaking with Amandala in December 2009, Foreign Affairs Minister Wilfred Elrington noted that even though there is a move to take the Belize-Guatemala dispute to the International Court of Justice for settlement under the OAS, there is a wider integration movement afoot: “...[J]ust how the people in Europe have come together – these 27 countries – that’s the move that is being made with respect to the 33 countries in this part of the world, from Mexico down, and then the Caribbean countries. That is presently being discussed almost on a monthly basis. ...”
Elrington said that the movement is intended to achieve the integration of “the entire 33 countries in this region.”
The participating countries at the Cancun summit were: Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Costa Rica Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Haiti, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, US Virgin Islands, and Venezuela.
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