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News : International : Organization of American States (OAS) Last Updated: Feb 13, 2017 - 1:45:37 AM


OAS Calls for Greater Integration and Expanding Domestic Markets at Opening of CELAC Summit
By OAS
Jan 29, 2015 - 11:08:52 AM

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The Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Miguel Insulza, urged the countries of the region to further integrate and to expand their domestic markets to restore the economic growth of the past decade, in his speech today at the opening ceremony of the summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in Costa Rica.

Secretary General Insulza said that the first challenge for Latin America and the Caribbean today is to restore the growth levels seen in the early twenty-first century, which allowed tens of millions of people to escape from poverty. “Many of the commercial and financial factors that allowed for the expansion of the last decade are no longer present in the global economy,” he warned. “Latin America and the Caribbean must be in a position to offset their absence with greater integration and expansion of their domestic markets, more effective savings and investment policies, higher quality education, development of their infrastructure, and enhanced technical and scientific capacity,” he said.

The leader of the hemispheric institution emphasized that today many countries in the region are experiencing slow growth, which jeopardizes the success achieved in reducing poverty and inequality. “The many millions of men, women and young people who emerged from poverty over the past decade and the many still living in poverty in our region expect their governments to be capable of crafting and coordinating effective public policies for overcoming those risks,” he added.

Noting that the CELAC Summit represents an opportunity for Latin America and the Caribbean to reach common positions to meet the challenge of achieving higher growth under the new conditions of the global economy, and at the same time "a fairer distribution of the fruits of that growth," the OAS Secretary General recalled that the next Summit of the Americas, to be held in Panama in April, will have as its central themes "prosperity and inequality." Alluding to the presence of Cuba in the next hemispheric meeting in Panama, and emphasizing the need for these issues to be discussed by all the governments in the region, he said the meeting "will be an historic event which will be attended, for the first time, by all the Heads of State and Government of the 35 independent States of the Americas.”

In his speech, Secretary General Insulza also referred to security issues facing the region, especially related to the scourges of drugs and organized crime. “In recent years, we have made headway in our quest for alternative approaches to dealing with those issues, convinced that repression is not enough and that what we need is a public health perspective, less imprisonment and more prevention, and more flexible administration of justice. Above all, we need to address the problems of exclusion that underlie much of the criminal behavior we endure,” added the Secretary General, under whose direction the OAS led a regional effort to study new approaches to the problem.

The OAS leader also called for broadening the unprecedented democratic process that the region is currently experiencing. “That process, as we well know, is still fragile and can suffer setbacks. Democratic elections, the rule of law, the separation of powers, political pluralism, and respect for human rights and freedom of expression, gender equality, and nondiscrimination are values we all proclaim but which still need to be greatly reinforced in our day-to-day lives,” he said.

At another point in his speech, Secretary General Insulza reiterated that the OAS and the CELAC are "designed to complement" one another. In this regard, he called on the countries of the region to seek consensus on major issues and try to bring common positions to major international events scheduled for the immediate future. “The formulation of a new round of post-2015 sustainable development goals and targets at the United Nations; the Climate Change Conference in Paris in 2015; and the Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly on the World Drug Problem. All these meetings are about to take place and afford an opportunity for Latin America and the Caribbean to speak with one voice. I sincerely hope that this Summit will bring us closer to that goal,” concluded the OAS Secretary General.

The Third CELAC Summit was officially opened by the President of Costa Rica, Luis Guillermo Solís, who said that the main goal of the region is to eradicate poverty. "I do not exaggerate when I say that there is no greater priority than ensuring the sustainability of public policies in the coming years that will lead us to defeat hunger and poverty in our region," said President Solís.

The Costa Rican President stressed the need to build bridges of cooperation with regional organizations. In this regard, he indicated that CELAC should work with greater organic and complementary coordination with institutions of the Inter-American System such as the OAS; the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB); the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO); the Inter-American Court of Human Rights; and others such as the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), the Central American Integration System (SICA), and the Mesoamerica Project. He also called on countries to "build on the framework of the Summit of the Americas and the Ibero-American Summit"; and highlighted the recent forum held between China and CELAC, and the forum to be held between CELAC and the European Union.

The opening ceremony of the CELAC was addressed by representatives of its member countries, and with the participation of representatives of international organizations such as the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Federica Mogherini; the Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), José Graziano da Silva; the Ibero-American General Secretary (SEGIB), Rebeca Grynspan; and the Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) United Nations, Alicia Bárcena.

A gallery of photos of the event is available here.

For more information, please visit the OAS Website at www.oas.org.

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