UNASUR’s growing pains

Excerpt from a good article by Alexei Barrionuevo from the New York Times. Click here for full article:

“Latin American leaders took another step away from the decades-old orbit of the United States at a meeting here that brought together nearly all of Latin America and the Caribbean, but excluded the United States and Europe.

The 31 Western Hemisphere leaders at a three-day meeting in Brazil included, clockwise from upper left, Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, Raúl Castro of Cuba, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil and Evo Morales of Bolivia. The United States was not invited.

And in the process of convening the leaders of 31 countries, Brazil once again flashed its credentials as the undisputed leader of Latin America.

But the host country’s highly popular president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, an ally of the United States, did not prevent the leaders from celebrating the inclusion of Raúl Castro, Cuba’s president, and from using the occasion to attack the United States and Europe for their roles in causing the global economic crisis that is roiling this region as well.

“Cuba is returning to where it always should have been,” Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s president, told reporters. “We are complete.”

The United States became a punching bag at the three-day conference, which ends Wednesday, in this tourist haven in Brazil’s Bahia State. Mr. Castro was hardly alone in assailing the United States and what he called its “neo-liberalist” model for the credit crisis, which is affecting many other economies.

But even as the Latin American leaders spoke of their collective power and growing unity, regional strains have been evident.

In Bolivia, Oscar Ortíz, the president of the Senate and a prominent critic of President Evo Morales, called on Unasur, the new regional body, to investigate further recent killings in northern Bolivia, which a Unasur commission described unequivocally as a massacre.

The region’s leaders continue to struggle to pick a leader for Unasur. Tabaré Vásquez, Uruguay’s president, said in October that he would oppose the nomination of former President Néstor Kirchner of Argentina, a stance that reflects the tense relations between the countries in the past year.

Tension has also been increasing between Ecuador and Brazil, with President Rafael Correa of Ecuador expelling executives from Odebrecht, a major Brazilian construction company, and disputing a loan by Brazil’s powerful national development bank, which finances public works projects throughout Latin America.

Castro’s first foreign trip as leader

The Cuban leader met his Venezuelan counterpart Hugo Chavez, a key ally of the communist-run island state and a long-time admirer of Fidel Castro.

After their meeting, the two leaders presided over the signing of a series of joint energy and commercial deals. Mr. Castro, 77,and Mr. Chávez discussed a range of cooperation projects in areas including agriculture, education, medicine and athletic training that are supported by thousands of Cuban advisers operating in Venezuela. The two leaders signed an agreement opening the way for Venezuela to continue assisting Cuba in increasing its oil-refining capacity and to eventually build a plant in Cuba to import liquid natural gas.

Cuba is by far the largest beneficiary of Venezuela’s foreign aid, receiving more than $150 million to build a petrochemical complex in Cienfuegos on Cuba’s southern coast. But with oil prices plunging recently, the financing for some of Venezuela’s foreign aid projects has come into question.

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