Thirty countries are gathered in Los Angeles until Friday, June 10. The meeting, supposed to display the copy cooperation between the United States and its neighbors, the opposite, risks highlighting all the divisions of a region where American influence in the economic and diplomatic sectors is in clear withdrawal.
Le Monde with AFP
The hopes of President Joe Biden to strengthen links with Latin America, on crucial subjects such as immigration, were severely showered Monday, June 6 by his Mexican counterpart who decided to boycott the “summit of the Americas” Open in Los Angeles to protest against the exclusion of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. These three countries have not been invited confirmed on Monday at the France-Presse agency an official of the White House emphasizing “the reservations” of the United States Face “the lack of democratic space and the respect of human rights” in These three countries. The Cuban government denounced the American decision not to invite it as “anti -democratic and arbitrary”.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador had said that he would not make the trip in such conditions, and he made his threat. “I do not go to the top because we do not invite all the countries of America. I believe in the need to change the policy that has been imposed for centuries: exclusion,” said before the press Mr. Lopez Obrador. It is his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Marcelo Ebrard, who will represent Mexico but the absence of Mr. Lopez Obrador automatically weighs on the scope of decisions that could be taken at the end of the summit.
“Mexico is an important player in the hemisphere. We are very happy that […] Foreign Minister Ebrard is present,” reacted Ned Price, spokesperson for the US State Department. The Cuban government has denounced the American decision not to invite it as “anti -democratic and arbitrary”.
immigration as a major theme
According to Joe Biden’s main advisor to Latin America, Juan Gonzalez, the American president will take advantage of the Americas summit to make announcements on economic cooperation and the fight against the Pandemic of Covid-19 as well as against the climate change. The 79 -year -old democrat, who will only go to Los Angeles on Wednesday, also hopes to conclude a regional cooperation agreement on a politically explosive subject, and who earned him violent criticism from the republican opposition: immigration, a major issue from domestic policy to the approach of mid-term elections.
The number of people seeking to enter the United States after fled poverty and violence in Central America and Haiti is increasing. The Biden administration has so far not brought its promise to conduct a renovated immigration policy, that it wants more human than that of the Trump mandate.
“The United States will disappoint”
Washington made sure of the arrival of certain major leaders, both the Argentinian president of center-left Alberto Fernandez and the Brazilian head of state, Jair Bolsonaro. But the absence of the Mexican president will be perceived as “significant”, according to Benjamin Gedan, who directs studies on Latin America at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. The researcher also notes that, where China invests heavily in the region, the American president has so far announced a substantial economic effort.
“We will have to judge the summit in terms of the United States proposals in terms of commercial access, loans and assistance to finance the takeover and infrastructure in the region,” said Benjamin Gedan. “And on these points, the United States will disappoint, it is inevitable,” he believes.
The Summit of the Americas was launched in 1994 in Miami by President Bill Clinton, eager to launch a vast regional trade in trade. But free trade is no longer on the rise, neither in the United States nor elsewhere, and in the matter Joe Biden did not basically break up with the protectionist reflexes of his predecessor Donald Trump.