Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar In Venezuela

Trinidad and Tobago Proposes The Incorporation of the Caribbean In The CELAC Troika.
Written by Celac | Saturday, 03 December 2011 15:50

Photo: Enrique Gonzalez.

Caracas, December 3, 2011 (Celac Press). - The Prime Minister of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, requests that during the second plenary meeting of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States there should be a fourth place in the CELAC troika for Caribbean nations.

She suggests that the Caribbean states with 14 English-speaking countries representing 14 votes be part of it. "I ask that it be considered at this meeting, to analyze the possibility that instead of a troika there be a quartet, to be given a voice to the 14 members of the Caribbean."

The Prime Minister comments, "CELAC is an example that there can be unity among people to overcome all obstacles and should be defined by giving priority to people-centered development."

The Troika is an alliance of three countries designated equally to provide support in the management of an organization. In CELAC Chile assumes temporary Presidency immediately after its formation, accompanying Venezuela and Cuba. END / Oriana Peña.

Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago Persad-Bissessar.
CELAC Represents A Geopolitical Revolution.
Radio Mundial | December 3, 2011 - 11:52 am

With regard to the pace of integration, the Trinidadian representative quoted Bolivar

when she said, "God rewards perseverance." It's time we look to the South
and that we develop as a region.(Photo Archive)

It is time to extend the agreements relating to gas. Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar, suggested that CELAC should include issues such as national security, illegal weapons, poverty reduction and the need for women's empowerment as a key strategy for development.

Said the Trinidadian leader: We have challenges are in the area of health with respect to the occurrence of diseases that must be tackled together. Another area referred to were the economic uncertainties that affect vulnerable economies and in this regard we should jointly develop strategies to improve competitiveness and productivity.

With regard to the pace of integration, the Trinidadian representative quoted Bolivar when she said, "God rewards perseverance." It's time we look to the South and develop as a region.

Our countries share more than borders, we also share challenges. There are no obstacles without opportunities. Together we can overcome obstacles. We represent a geopolitical revolution.

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad Thinks That With CELAC A Geopolitical Institutional Development Will Be Forged.

La Patilla | December 2, 2011 1:09 pm

Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, arrived Friday at Simon Bolivar International Airport, Maiquetia in Venezuela to attend the summit establishing the Community of Latin American and Caribbean (CELAC), which will be held this 2 and 3 December in the capital, Caracas.

After being received by Vice President Elias Jaua, the prime minister said that the creation of the Celac is about forging geopolitical institutional development for our countries.

"We belong to southern hemisphere and we have always looked to the north, it was time to really look south to south and share our great heritage. There is great diversity in culture between us but we can achieve greater strength in establishing this unity between our peoples." she said.

She said the challenges are common: financial, health and gender, in which all we have to fight together in order overcome them.

A total of 33 countries will participate this Friday in the installation of the Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean (CALC), which give way to Celac, and in which the broad participation of the Heads of State and Government of the region that have arrived in the country since last Wednesday is expected. AVN

On Venezuelan territory, Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar.
Somos La Noticia | 12/02/2011 at 12:51 PM.

On Friday evening at Maiquetía International Airport, Vargas, Vice President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Elias Jaua, received the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, who will attend the Summit of Latin American and Caribbean States (CALC) as part of delegations which are made up of ministers and deputy ministers of several Caribbean countries, many of whom are already in our country.

Persad, expressed her pleasure at being in Venezuelan territory and said, "Our waters and yours come to both lands and when the Orinoco River is high, this same water reaches our shores."

"Chavez assured leaders he will survive cancer, reiterating that
he underwent recent tests in Cuba after finishing chemotherapy
and they found no "malignant cells in any part of my body, thanks to God."

Trinidad's prime minister gave Chavez a little bottle of what she described
as holy water, and Chavez thanked her saying:
"Soon we will have a summit of those of us who've beaten cancer." SOURCE

N.B. Apologies for the clumsy translation. The Spanish that I am working with is an interpreter's translation into Spanish of what our Prime Minister said. Things are lost in translation so I had to careful that I did not add things that our PM did not say.

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A Note From The Gull

Our presence at this Summit certainly meant a lot for our country and the strengthening of relations with our closest neighbour to the South and South and Central America. In my opinion our PM looked more at home in Venezuela than she has anywhere else in the world and her choice of that gift for El Presidente could only have been directed by the heart.

There are deep, deep roots that we share with Venezuela: cultural traditions that still persist to this day in our lifeways. We often forget that Trinidad and Tobago hosts nodes of several diasporas apart from the East Indian and African, and that many of the ancestors of our citizens of First Nations, Spanish, Spanish/African and European descent came from Venezuela as nomads, administrators, traders, entrepreneurs, agricultural workers, etc....and they are still coming! The flow also went the other way and natives of this country and the Caribbean have over the years migrated to Venezuela looking for better opportunities and have made their mark on the culture and industries of that country.

Llanero,
Le deseo buena salud para que usted puede continuar por muchos años más amando la tierra de su nacimiento - la reina de su corazón. Sabemos sin duda que cuando aún no estamos aquí en la carne, nuestros espíritus, así nuestros antepasados, continuarán habitando la naturaleza, los bosques profundos y las amplias llanuras.

¡Salud, fraternidad y siempre, siempre, siempre la música! Bendiciones.

AHAKUTUWATIWA, ALËLEKATIWA, AKUYAWATIWA!
We Awake, We Laugh, We Return!

"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.

Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.

Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare

CELAC On The Web

The Website of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Countries [CELAC] can be found here.

CELAC is also on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/#!/CELAC2011
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"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.

Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.

Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare

CELAC Signals Start Of A New Era In Latin America.

CELAC Signals Start of a New Era in Latin America.
By Guy Taylor
World Politics Review | 05 May 2011

A new regional cooperation bloc to include every country in the Americas except Canada and the United Sates has received almost no coverage in the English-language media. Some observers, however, believe the Community of Latin American and Carribean States -- CELAC for its Spanish acronym -- represents the first step in a historic geopolitical shift away from an era dominated by pro-U.S. policies.

"It's a regional grouping for a new era really, which is no longer about free trade and neoliberalism," says Alexander Main at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington.

Foreign ministers from several of CELAC's 32 member countries approved a draft document outlining procedures and an operational framework for the organization in Caracas, Venezuela, last month. Some are calling the document an official charter, and according to Main, who spoke with Trend Lines earlier this week, its official approval is now very likely by the time Latin American heads of state gather for the organization's inaugural summit in July.

CELAC's makeup is similar to that of the Rio Group, an informal grouping of Latin American and Caribbean states begun in 1986 and heralded as an alternative forum to the Organization of American States (OAS), of which both Canada and the United States are members. The core difference is that upon official approval of its framework document, CELAC will take a step toward a level of formal and legal legitimacy never enjoyed by the Rio Group.

Furthermore, according to Main, past regional gatherings of foreign and finance ministers have "never been so comprehensive, with all of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean present -- and the U.S. and Canada completely absent."

CELAC has the support of both Mexico and Brazil, the weightiest economic forces in the Americas when Canada and the United States are not present. One of the bloc's key features is a collective desire to increase regional "solidarity and social inclusion and enhance 'complementarity' between the region's economies," said Main.

"They're trying to figure out ways their economies can complement each other, rather than follow the strict path of competitive economic relations," he said, noting that recent years have also been characterized by an increasingly shared political agenda among Latin American governments regardless of their internal politics.

"It's not just Bolivia and Ecuador [or Venezuela] that are trying to push a social agenda," said Main. "Governments, regardless of whether they lean right or left, are giving more priority to addressing the symptoms and the causes of poverty, at a minimum in their discourse, as well as making a priority of a social agenda that was for so long undermined, even marginalized during the phase of neoliberalism."

With the U.S. economy alone equal to that of all other countries in the region combined, relations and trade agreements have long been dominated by U.S. policy. The OAS has, in turn, played a dominant role as the region's international cooperation and coordination body.

While Main asserted that one driving force behind CELAC has been a shared antipathy among high-level regional players toward the United States' historically self-important posture within the OAS, the extent to which CELAC may undercut the organization's dominance during the years ahead remains to be seen.

Alexander Main offers regular analysis on Latin American affairs at the Center for Economic and Policy Research. He authored this piece about CELAC's formation last year.

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"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.

Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.

Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare

The Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac)

Rousseff, Fernández open the doors to Celac Summit
Foreign ministers will refine the agreement to be initialed by Latin American and Caribbean presidents in their meeting on December 2-3. The summit will bring to life a regional body comprising 33 countries that will receive the "heritage" of the Rio Group and the Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean.

Senior officials met on Wednesday in Caracas in the preparations for the Celac Summit (Photo: AVN)

EL UNIVERSAL | Wednesday November 30, 2011 05:39 PM

Argentinean President Cristina Fernández and her Brazilian counterpart Dilma Rousseff will be the first two heads of state arriving in Venezuela to attend the Summit of the Community of Latin America and the Caribbean (Celac). Thirty-two countries have been invited to the meeting that will take place on December 2-3 in Caracas.

Fernandez is scheduled to arrive in Caracas on Wednesday night, while Rousseff will be in Caracas on Thursday. Both are expected to hold a bilateral meeting on December 2, before the presidential summit, which will be preceded by a meeting of foreign ministers on December 1, EFE reported.

Foreign ministers will refine the agreement to be initialed by Latin American and Caribbean presidents in their meeting on December 2-3. The summit will bring to life a regional body comprising 33 countries that will receive the "heritage" of the Rio Group and the Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean (CALC).

Both the US and Canada are excluded from Celac.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez reported days ago that the Heads of State and Government and the Prime Ministers of the 32 countries composing Celac together with Venezuela have confirmed their attendance to the summit.

Fernández, who will be the first regional leader to arrive in Caracas, will meet on Thursday with Chávez. Both presidents are close friends.

"We always have issues of bilateral interest in our agenda, such as transfer technology and expertise in the industrial, food, and cultural areas," said Argentina's Ambassador to Venezuela Ana Alicia de Castro on October 26.

Fernández's visit to Caracas is her first trip abroad since her re-election with more than 53% of the vote on October 23.

Chávez describes Fernández as one of the "major champions" of the "South American Union."

Argentinean Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman said on November 22 that he has "great expectations" about the Celac Summit. "The mere fact of having achieved the unity of all the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean is something that will be remembered in history," noted Timerman.

Timerman stressed that the inclusion of the Caribbean "is a key piece" in the recovery of a region "that had been divided" by the "dominant powers."

On June 6, when Rousseff welcomed Chávez in Brasilia shortly before her Venezuelan counterpart underwent surgery in Cuba to remove a cancerous tumor, she declared that her country was ready to support any initiative to turn South America into a zone of peace and democracy.

"Brazil and Venezuela have a common goal to turn South America into a place of peace, democracy, development, and respect for human rights," said Rousseff.

In the framework of the Celac Summit, a meeting of representatives of the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) will take place as well.

Translated by Maryflor Suárez R.

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A Note From The Gull

"The creation of Celac coincides with the search for a regional institutional framework that brings together the countries that are part of the Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean and the Rio Group in a political bloc that serves as their voice."

All heads of State and Government are expected to be present in the meeting, which was initially scheduled for July 2011, but was postponed due to President Hugo Chavez's illness. The meetings are taking place at Venezuela's largest military base, Fort Tiuna, in southwest Caracas.

The CELAC is a multilateral political body whose main objective is to consolidate the integration and complementarity among the 33 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean.

"Founded on 23 Feb 2010 in Mexico, it groups all the countries of the Americas except the United States and Canada...

"Venezuela describes the founding of CELAC as part of the continued emancipation of the region. Once formalized, it is expected to function parallel to the Organization of American States (OAS), which includes the United States and Canada. Venezuela, the interim president, and Chile have been selected to write the organization’s statutes and host its summits over the next two years.

"According to the draft charter, a central concept of the bloc's multilateral trade is that it won't be dominated by any one country. Economic, financial, and technological cooperation should be promoted among already existing regional integration organizations, according to the document. It lists the Common Market of the South, the Community of Andean Nations, the Caribbean Community, and the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America.

"The charter aims to address the inequality of wealth in the CELAC region. SOURCE"

So wish I could have been there to witness this historic event.

"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.

Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.

Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare

PM To Visit Venezuela

"Asked about the potential negative effects on the nation’s tourism and investment thrusts, she noted that several countries had expressed an interest in investing in Trinidad and Tobago and she should be going to Venezuela to discuss bilateral and Caribbean relations with President Hugo Chavez." SOURCE

Excellent news! Hugo Chávez Frías, the President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, our closest neighbour to the South, had invited our PM to visit that country since August last year. Maybe it had to be postponed because of his health problems but better late than never. I heartily applaud this decision.

Never dismiss counterpoints - they add interest and complexity to the play. This insane urge to homogenise, to flatten and blanch and dominate everything threatens diversity when the preservation of diversity, even in genetics, is of crucial importance to our survival.
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"Patria est communis omnium parens" - Our native land is the common parent of us all. Keep it beautiful, make it even more so.

Blessed is all of creation
Blessed be my beautiful people
Blessed be the day of our awakening
Blessed is my country
Blessed are her patient hills.

Mweh ka allay!
Guanaguanare