The upcoming gathering in Los Ángeles is shaping up to be not a genuine ‘Summit of the Américas’, but a ‘Summit of regional US allies’.
By Aljazeera – John Kirk
Jun 1, 2022
From June 6 to 10 Los Ángeles will host the “Summit of the Américas,” with the basic goal of strengthening hemispheric solidarity. At a time when Washington is increasingly involved in supporting the war in Ukraine, and fending off Chinese strategic and commercial advances in the Global South, having a strong show of support in the Américas would be helpful for the beleaguered Biden administration.
Except that this isn’t happening. The sticking point is the determination of Washington to invite to the summit only those countries with which it has solid relations – which means that Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela are not wanted. (Host countries issue the invitations and even though Cuba participated in the last two summits, this time it has not been invited.)
The Biden administration says it selects countries based upon the acceptance of political freedom, human rights and democratic values – which is why these three countries are not welcome. Their approaches to human rights and liberal democracy are certainly different from those found in the other countries, and leave much to be desired.
At the same time, many of the invited countries are not paragons of such values – as a quick look at Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch reports on the region would attest. In Colombia, a close US ally, 138 human rights activists were assassinated in 2021. In México this year alone 11 journalists have been murdered. The former president of Honduras, another US ally (despite a questionable re-election), has now been extradited on drugs and weapons charges. In Brazil, Bolsonaro, the self-styled “Trump of the Americas,” has threatened to reject upcoming election results and call upon the military to support him. Yet these countries – and several others with equally dubious track records – are invited to Los Angeles.
The focus of the summit is to commit to “concrete actions that dramatically improve pandemic response and resilience, promote a green and equitable recovery, bold strong and inclusive democracies, and address the root causes of irregular migration”.
Clearly, these are key issues. To deal with “irregular migration”, it would make sense to have México at the table since Customs and Border Protection officials stopped more than 221,000 immigrants at the southern border in March of 2022. By the end of 2021 more than 1.5 million people had arrived at the border, with more than one million of them sent back.
Mexican President López Obrador, however, has decided not to attend – unless all countries of the Américas can participate. The leaders of Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Honduras, Guatemala, and several Caribbean states have also declared that they won’t go, or else will send lower-profile delegations.
And for a summit that aims to “dramatically improve pandemic response,” it seems odd to exclude Cuba – the only country in Latin América to have developed its own COVID vaccines, to have sent thousands of medical professionals abroad to help people during the pandemic, and to have fully vaccinated 96 percent of the population. (Latest figures show fewer than 70 COVID cases per day.)
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Read More: Aljazeera – The 2022 Summit of the Américas: An embarrassment for Biden
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