BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, JULY 9TH 2010 (CUOPM Press Release) – St. Kitts and Nevis’ Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Hon. Sam Condor was among foreign ministers and ambassadors from 24 nations attending a Summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC).
The Meeting in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, debated Venezuela’s proposed integration plan and designated Venezuela and Chile to write the organization’s statutes and host its summits over the next two years.
The CELAC, which includes most countries in the region south of the United States and Canada, was created in February at a presidential summit in Mexico, during which Venezuela was elected as the organization’s first interim president. It is expected to function parallel to the Organization of American States (OAS) once it is formalized.
The foreign ministers of Costa Rica, Guatemala, Panama, Belize, El Salvador, Ecuador, Argentina, Grenada, México, Uruguay, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Haiti, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, as well as ambassadors from Antigua and Barbuda, Colombia, Nicaragua, and Trinidad and Tobago attended Saturday’s summit.
The leaders agreed that the left wing government of Venezuela and the right wing government of Chile would co-chair a joint commission to draft the statutes of the emerging integration bloc. Venezuela will host a summit of heads of state on July 5, 2011 at which the CELAC will be formally inaugurated, and Chile will host the next summit in 2012.
In addition, Venezuela presented a potential program and set of principles for the CELAC titled “Plan Caracas,” which the summit participants discussed.
As an economic model, Plan Caracas proposes a multilateral system of “fair trade” that is not dominated by any one country. The goal of such a system should be to end the vast inequality of wealth distribution in the region, according to the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry’s website.
Economic, financial, and technological cooperation should be promoted among already existing regional integration organizations such as the Common Market of the South, the Community of Andean Nations, the Caribbean Community, and the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America, according to the proposal.
Plan Caracas also prioritizes fulfilling the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, including the eradication of poverty and illiteracy, and cooperation in humanitarian assistance and natural disaster preparation.
In public announcements simultaneous to the summit on Saturday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said his country proposes a multilateral plan for the rational use of energy with the goal of achieving “energy security” for every member of the organization, but did not provide further details.
“This is our agenda, and with it we want to leave behind this terrible period of impositions by the government of the United States, impositions made many times through the OAS, that have condemned the majority of our peoples to misery, backwardness, dependence, and under development,” Chavez said. “Only united will Latin Americans be completely independent.”
To further debate these ideas and prepare for next year’s summit, the foreign ministers agree to meet again in Caracas this September 6.
Since his election over eleven years ago, Chavez has been a strong proponent of regional integration and unity and an opponent of U.S. imperialism.
Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro said the decision made in Mexico in February that Venezuela should host the CELAC’s first meeting constituted “a clear recognition of the efforts of President Chavez and the Bolivarian Revolution to construct Latin American and Caribbean integration, and to drive forward the union of our peoples with strength.”
