Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Paraguay and the Southern Cone




It is welcome to see steady progress in the Southern Cone.  This has taken years, but the magnet of a truly emergent Brazil has shortened all paths and the ancient problems are seen to be dissipating.   Outsider interpretations tend to be specious, including my own, but I do subscribe to historic inevitability.  The designation remains clear.

And while Western eyes are elsewhere, South America is finally getting on with their future with rapid growth setting in.

It has been a long wait.  Paraguay has huge oil potential in the Eastern part of the country.

Paraguay's diplomatic offensive is showing results


MONDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 2013
BY PETER TASE AND MARTIN BARILLAS


Paraguayan President Horacio Cartes conducted his first official visit to the Vatican. Meeting with Pope Francis on November 25, Cartes broke little new ground since Paraguay (a predominantly Catholic country) has long had good relations with the Holy See. These bilateral relations only improved following the visit of Pope John Paul II to Paraguay in 1988.


Pope Francis and President Cartes held a private meeting for 30 minutes. After an exchange of gifts, Pope Francis met briefly with Cartes’ family members. The Paraguayan leader was  accompanied by his sister, Sarah, and his two daughters, Sofia and Maria Sol. Also attending were Foreign Minister Eladio Loizaga, General Secretary of Presidency Juan Carlos Lopez Moreira, and private secretary Fernando Ojeda.


In an indication of preferential treatment, the pontiff will meet with Cartes again on November 26 during a Mass to be celebrated in the chapel of the papal residence. 


For President Cartes this is the eight official visit since beginning his term in August  of this year. Unlike any previous Paraguayan president, Cartes has begun a vibrant, proactive and pragmatic foreign policy which is intended to bring benefits to Paraguay through international commerce, research and development, and the promotion of Paraguay’s image abroad as a country with abundant natural resources. His diplomatic campaign is intended to improve the current image of Paraguay has outside of the country.


Paraguay and MERCOSUR

Even though Cartes has been very active in promoting his nation’s potential in the Latin American region and Europe, Paraguay’s re-integration in the MERCOSUR is a process that requires its own time and is slowly advancing.  He has already visited Spain, which was his first diplomatic destination. He has also visited Uruguay and Brazil. According to foreign minister Loizaga, “It is logical that National Congress has a constitutional role to play in regards to Paraguay active role in the MERCOSUR regional trade Block. Especially in approving bilateral treaties and international agreements so that Paraguay could be fully re-incorporated in the international stage.”


During the previous government, Paraguay strongly objected to admitting Venezuela to the MERCOSUR regional trade alliance. This came about when Paraguay was summarily ousted from MERCOSUR after accusations emerged that former President Fernando Lugo had been illegally impeached. Since President Cartes has sought to mend fences with his immediate neighbors,  MERCOSUR member countries have shown some signs of respecting Paraguayan institutions and, particularly, its congress.


Lozaiga extolled the thawing of Paraguay’s relationship with neighboring Latin countries. “We are working with our partners: Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay. We have worked on the lists (Ed. note: to make inroads with EU markets), but I say again that Paraguay will bring forward everything necessary, and that there is respect on the part of MERCOSUR member states for Paraguay’s position.” 


Relations between MERCOSUR and Paraguay appear to be on the way to normalization. However, so far there is no sign that Paraguay will attend the multilateral MERCOSUR conference to be held inVenzuela next month. No invitation has emerged from Venezuelan President Francisco Maduro.  Paraguay continues to maintain that the admission of Venezuela into MERCOSUR still needs the approval of Parguay’s congress. Earlier this month, Paraguayan foreign minister Lozaiga said “we are working to find a juridical solution with political backing”.


Paraguay continues to protest that its suspension from MERCOSUR, over the impeachment and removal of ex-President Fernando Lugo, did not follow the guidelines of the trading bloc. Venezuela was then given admission to MERCOSUR by three other full members (Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay) when Paraguay was suspended. Even while the Organization of American States validated the impeachment process, MERCOSUR called it a “congressional coup” orchestrated by Lugo’sopponents. That Uruguay’s leftist President José Mujica said of Venezuela’s admission to MERCOSUR that “sometimes political issues must overcome institutional situations,” has only validated the perception that Paraguay was a pawn in a regional tectonic shift to the left and away from the United States.


Paraguay is now surrounded by countries that have ticklish relations with the U.S. and that have shown increasingly independent stances. With a likely victory for leftist Michelle Bachelet in Chile presidential runoff election, a continuing veer to the left in the Southern Cone is in the offing. It was during the government under interim President Federico Franco – Lugo’s former vice-president – that relations with the U.S. improved. For example, closer cooperation emerged under Franco with the U.S. in areas such as narcotrafficking and terrorism, and trade. Now in office in August 2013, President Cartes has demanded Paraguay’s full re-incorporation into MERCOSUR, which respects Paraguay’s political processes, international law and MERCOSUR guidelines.


For now, Paraguay is actively conducting bilateral meetings with Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, especially in the area of trade. Paraguayan businesses have loudly complained about what they consider unnecessary delays and harassment by Argentine customs officials that have had a negative impact on Paraguayan commerce, for example. Argentina’s President Cristina Kirchner, who has been closely aligned with Venezuela throughout her term, has been a vocal critic of Paraguay and its institutions and has managed to stir up nationalist sentiments in Paraguay with which it has had troubled relations ever since the fratricidal Tri-Partite War in the 1860s.

One area that may show results of Paraguay’s smile campaign came last week when the Bolivian Foreign Affairs Minister David Choquehuanco visited Cartes to discuss final details of a an agreement on supplying liquefied natural gas from the Andean republic.  Even while Bolivia and Paraguay went to war in the 1930s over petroleum reserves in Paraguay’s Chaco region, they do have commonalities. Both Bolivia and Paraguay have seen a resurgence of pride in their respective pre-Columbian national heritage and Amerindian languages; both are landlocked because of disastrous wars; and they share a common resentment towards countries such as Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay, which are mostly Hispanic and European in orientation, and where Bolivian and Paraguayan nationals feel marginalized.


Spero columnist Peter M. Tase writes on international and trade issues. Martin Barillas edits Speroforum.


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