Latin American and Caribbean countries should strive for an alliance similar to the European Union, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopes Obrador believes, proposing a new direction to move those countries away from the Organization of American States (OAS) in which Washington plays a major role.
The host of the meeting, the left-wing Mexican president, also known by the initials AMLO, told almost 20 presidents and prime ministers at the summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) that the alliance can help the economies of the region affected by inequality, as well as in the fight against health and other crises.
"In these times, CELAC can become the main instrument of consolidating relations between Latin American and Caribbean nations," he said at the opening of the summit in the Mexican capital, reports Hina.
AMLO: To build something similar to the forerunner of today's EU
CELAC has existed for ten years and is considered to be more left-wing than the OAS. CELAC fosters better relations with Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, led by the left, and one of the biggest supporters of that alliance was the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, writes Bloomberg.
Unlike the OAS, which is headquartered in Washington, CELAC's members are not the United States and Canada, but neither is Brazil, where far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, who stepped down last year, is in power. The OAS previously expelled Cuba and Venezuela from its ranks, and recognized the opposition government of Juan Guaido, who is supported by Western countries, in that country.
"We need to build something similar to the economic community that was the forerunner of today's European Union on the American continent," said AMLO, emphasizing the need to respect the sovereignty of regional states. "It will be a truly autonomous organization that will not serve anyone, but will be an intermediary," the Mexican president announced last month.
The meeting in Mexico City put the spotlight on the region's leftist leaders, including Peru's new president Pedro Castillo, Cuba's Miguel Díaz-Canel and Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro.
Uruguayan President Luis Lacalje, considered a center-right politician, stressed that his participation in the rally does not mean that he supports some authoritarian regimes in the region.
"We are concerned and we are following what is happening in Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela," Lacalje said, calling the actions of those governments repressive.
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