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FOR THE INTEGRATION AND THE UNITY OF LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN

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COPPPAL celebrates its 20th anniversary of its foundation. At that time the situation of Latin American and Caribbean Continent presented a scene of concerns and conflicts. The world suffered the consequences of the cold war, the nuclear holocaust was a terrifying possibility, the Continent was ruled by military dictatorships and democracy survived in few nations; bordering conflicts threaten with fratricidal wars and the economic integration of the Continent was like an utopia while poverty and social marginalization wreaked havoc with this fragile sectors of the society.

Twenty years later democracy is an unquestionable value in the political life of the continent. Military dictatorships are just an opprobrious memory. The armed conflicts suffered by many Central American countries have been surpassed through political negotiations. Bordering conflicts have been solved practically by means of dialogue and consensus.

The economic integration among our nations has advanced at a dizzy speed. The economic growth in the region- although there has not been reflected a fair distribution of welfare yet- has been considerable, interrupting the lost decade of the eighties.

During all this process, Latin American political parties played a fundamental role, they- together with their societies- were the ones who defeated intrepidly and heroically authoritarian and dictatorial regimes and were the instruments to regain freedom and the free exercise of the popular will. However, with an eye on the new millennium, there still are necessary progresses to be done in view of old problems such as the eradication of poverty and marginalization, and our commitment to fight against the continuous presence of colonialism in order to promptly and finally eradicate it.

But those problems suffered twenty years ago have been substituted by others that also claim for the fundamental role of political parties.

With the beginning of XXI century, Latin America and the Caribbean must define the role they will play in the new global order as a region which is composed by its common roots, trade and financial exchanges and caring cooperation.

Latin America and the Caribbean, due to its demographic importance, its natural resources, its geographical location, have strategic, geopolitical and geo-economic potentials necessary to play a decisive role in the construction of the new millennium world. But this role will only be played if they achieve the development of their democracies and if they are able to eradicate poverty, marginalization and corruption among their political leaders.

In the XXII Plenary Session, held in Oaxaca, Mexico, COPPPAL (Permanent Conference of Political Parties from Latin America and the Caribbean), encouraged by the progress of its own reform, urge citizens, governments and congresses, political parties, media and public opinion to promote a new Latin American commitment that, supported by an unbreakable political will and the application of the suitable instruments, enable us to take definitive steps to achieve are joint objectives.

In the face of globalization: A Latin American and Caribbean Community of Nations

Globalization is, at the beginning of a new century, the mandatory point of reference of our countries and if we want to influence it we must intensify the efforts of our societies, their economic potentialities and political actions on a regional basis.

Globalization is a threat to our nations, but it is also an opportunity. The scientific-technological and military hegemony of the United States, the financial flows of speculated capital, the aid regime prevailing in the most developed countries, the tariff and non-tariff barriers that hold back the development of our economies, are factors that negatively affect the construction of a new and fairer global, political and economic order and the democratic governability of our nations. It is necessary to pay special attention to the advance registered in the fight for human rights and the internationalization of crimes of that kind.

In such respect, the fight in favor of the democratization of international organizations and the strengthening of multilateralism that rules the relationships between States and people cannot be postponed. It is necessary to focus our attention on the reform of the ON and the international financial system, establishing a common agenda that faces the problems of speculated cash flows, stability of currencies, and the asymmetry of the adjustment mechanisms in case of development imbalances.

On the other hand, it is really worrying the problem of the foreign debts of our countries: with the beginning of the new millennium, we support the exigency to cancel the debts of poorest countries, taking into account that debt is unplayable and that its services contribute only to the greater impoverish of our societies absorbing a huge proportion of national incomes.

We live in a world even more complex and interdependent; therefore we are unable to develop all of our abilities to face international competence, the specialization of markets, the development of new technologies and more sophisticated nets of financial exchange.

The economic blocs from Latin American, the European Union and Pacific Asia, make us face a reality that actually we can turn into opportunities: it is necessary to speed up the mechanism of integration that enables us to build competitive regional markets, with conditions that favor the interests of our countries and contribute to increase the standards of living of our people.

Integration, towards a Latin American and Caribbean Community, has advanced but there still are many things to do. We must move from commercial integration to more successful formulas of political and economic coordination, investment treatment and especially political, social and cultural integrations that enable us to act together in the global scene.

The political party members of COPPPAL find it necessary to establish an agenda of actions regarding the steps to be followed towards a continental, lively, active and different unity. Therefore, we suggest the following: we must design a new institutionalism for the region and it must be for Latin America and the Caribbean. And we do not start from scratch: Rio Group, the sub-regional economic agreements (MERCOSUR, Andean Community, Group of Three composed by Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela, SIECA and CARICOM) make up a platform of the new institutionalism to be achieved, that emerge from the nineties replacing the institutionalism of the Cold War.

The region, then, would be in conditions of participating, together with the Unites States, in the negotiations related to the American Common Trade, taking into account the fact that Latin American and Caribbean societies do not accept an economic model that could cause greater inequity and poverty. We want a continental economy that strengthens social equity and the generation of opportunities to us all. We are going to protect our resources and strategic areas because they guarantee the future of our next generations. We will turn frontiers into spaces for work and cooperation, with the prospect of a regional integration.

To defend sovereignty

In the face of new threats, we need to protect and strengthen the sovereignty of Latin American nations that comes from the own societies and is established for their own benefit, just like culture, values and independency in order to achieve their self-determinations, without ignoring the exigencies or regional integration.

We reject the attempts of transgression to the international order, through actions of extraterritorial intervention which are condemned due to their illegal and immoral nature.

It is unacceptable the fact that the tendency towards a greater unity of nations gets tarnished by actions leading to the isolation of any country, on the pretext of its democratization and, even more important, the tendency to applying laws on a extraterritorial basis that are expressly against trade, the dignity of nations and the established international right.

An integral view towards migration

With globalization, in Central America and the entire Continent, the migration phenomenon demands an integral view to direct the steps to be followed by our countries so as to maintain the rights and dignity of those who look for opportunities, beyond the frontiers of the nation were they were born.

We condemn the attacks to which the people who travel to other countries in search of job and better perspectives are subject.

Immediate agreements must be promoted in the region, in order to constructively regulate migration and in accordance with the full respect for human rights.

Joint responsibility to the fight against organized crime.

The fight against drug trafficking, terrorism and other transnational crimes must be supported following a criterion of responsibility based on the search of new ways of bilateral and multilateral cooperation, founded on the principles of respect for national sovereignty and directed to create the efficient instruments that contribute to face successfully those great challenges.

On the other hand, if there are no economic or social developments in accordance with equity, there will be citizen insecurity, which makes citizen’s claims in favor of authoritarianism become even stronger. All these elements result in an evident risk for democracy.

Population ageing: an immediate problem.

The accelerated ageing of the world population has placed old age as a new problem in the global agenda. Presently, almost 10% of the citizens in our countries are ranked as elder. It is estimated that in 2005 this figure will double in number.

COPPPAL political parties deem it necessary to face the problem of ageing from a wide point of view in order to achieve a better standard of living not only regarding health care. Therefore, it is necessary to take this group of people into account with their potentialities granted by their long experience and our interest to deal with new areas of knowledge. So, we suggest deeming adults as a segment of the population with specific contributions and not only as receptors of a benefic action made by the rest of the society.

To encourage interparliamentary communication

Interparliamentary communication has to play a fundamental role in view of the project of a community of the nations from Latin America and the Caribbean.

The communication among congresses and parliaments is quite far from following the fast pace of our commercial and cooperation relationships.

It is time to encourage regional interparliamentary relationships in order to reach important objectives and maintain joint positions regarding different international issues, as well as in multilateral forums.

Governments´ renewed will

COPPPAL considers that the evolution of the continent demands governing with an open view in order to share equal and fair opportunities for both women and men.

Our governments, beyond the political party that promoted them, must act in accordance with the great conviction of building a Community of Nations from Latin America and the Caribbean.

It is urgently necessary for governments to become promoters of normative instruments in order to favor more intensive economic exchanges and a more efficient framework of cooperation among our countries.

They must adopt common positions in the face of regional issues and before multilateral organizations.

It is convenient to encourage coincident legislations regarding those issues referred to this area, such as migration, fight against drug trafficking, terrorism and gun-running.

We are sure that the task of the government cannot be separated from the reflection on new problems that emerge from regionalization regarding democracy, governability and sovereignty.

A new balance among State, Trade and Society

The political parties which are members of COPPPAL highlight the necessity of a State that could harmonize the objectives of democracy, social equity and equal opportunities with efficient, competitive and legitimate trades that protect society against the power of monopolies and transnational companies. We aspire to a decentralized State, but with force and ductility necessary to impose control, supervising and regulating measures over private business actions that guarantee the interest of the nation and promote its development.

We reject the idea that trade, on its own, is sufficient to guarantee a fair welfare distribution. Therefore, we do not agree with the minimum State that suggests neo-liberalism, since the State must definitely guarantee health, education, security and employment for everybody. So, the State must adopt progressive fiscal policies, regulate public services, control cash flows, encourage the development of small and midsized companies and the sustainable use of natural resources. All this is must be carried out in relation to human development, the defense of nature, national independency and regional integration.

Society has the right and the responsibility of participating in the design of its options of development, in the instrumentation of them, in the control and regulation of institutional mechanisms that rule them, exercising the initiative and the action that emerge from its mandate over the State and the nature of its needs and demands.

Consolidating a full democracy

During the last twenty years, the political parties from Latin America and the Caribbean have made an important contribution to conquer democratic processes and to carry out those reforms claimed by our societies. However, there still are important matters regarding their consolidation and deepening that oblige them to face new challenges.

We must build a democracy that promotes political stability and guarantees justice, eradicates social discrimination, and solves pacifically conflicts. In such respect, we must guarantee equity between women and men, and eradicate any kind of discrimination against women, as a necessary condition to achieve democracy. We need a democracy with competitive elections, which incorporates participatory mechanisms of plebiscite and referendum, without distorting the essential characteristics of the representative democracy.

The impossibility of fulfilling coherent political programs and the great conditioning resulting from international organizations have been undermining citizen credibility and their trust in democratic institutionalism. This phenomenon has caused the emergence of new factors through which the society has tried to express itself and submit its claims to the political system. Not only do we have to reaffirm the irreplaceable role of political parties, but we also need to have the ability of assimilating constructively the contribution emerging from these new social factors in the construction and consolidation of our democracies.

Nevertheless, there is a factor that hinders the achievement of a full democracy in Latin America and the Caribbean which is the stressed questioning towards political parties, their leaders and even towards politics as a human activity emerging especially from society’s antidemocratic sides, presently deprived from their old privileges, and the manipulation they make of the new and old factors of power.

But there also exist strong doses of responsibility that lays on political leaders and parties. It is necessary to carry out an integral and deep political reform starting from revaluing the relationships between ethic and politics and including a strong fight against corruption. It is necessary to democratize the own inner life of the political parties; control the use of resources, their relationships with the factors of the economic sector. Our political parties must be renovating factors in social life and must recovery the servicing spirit. Likewise, they must guarantee transparency, openness and moral and intellectual honesty in their structures.

It is also important to urge mass media to comply with their roles. The growing concentration of power in few hands constitute a real risk for the construction of a democratic culture and a potential risk of distortion of the general interests of the society in view of the institutional system.

Greeting Latin America and Caribbean societies

COPPPAL, according to its plurality and its position in favor of Latin American and Caribbean integration, greets the societies of the region. We move towards a new millennium with the conviction that we actually know the kind of destiny we want for us and future generations, always protecting the identity of all of our nations and their condition of sovereign nations.

It is time to work together on the construction of a Community of Nations from Latin America and the Caribbean.

COPPPAL’s new commitment

The political parties that are members of COPPPAL ratify their commitment to constructing a Community of Nations from Latin America and the Caribbean, thinking together about the future in order to face it through joint actions and achieving the objectives they have agreed on.

The principles of solidarity, self-determination of societies; non-intervention, pacific solutions to conflicts; prohibition of threats and the use of force; judicial equity of States and the respect for international right; the joint initiative to achieve a sustainable development in the region and the fight in favor of peace and security, constitute a group of objectives through which COPPPAL reaffirms its ethic, social and political commitment to guide their daily fights in favor of Latin American and Caribbean societies.

 Oaxaca, October 12th , 1999.