Working toward an integrated Americas

Let's be clear. The pursuit of a Free Trade Area of the Americas, which continues in earnest this week in Miami, is an eminently worthwhile effort. But everyone should keep this much in mind: So far, there is no FTAA agreement. The Miami meeting is one in a long series of discussions. No one, not even negotiators, now knows what an FTAA might be in final form, nor should they state categorically what it will mean or do. We simply don't know. We can discuss FTAA goals and the process. But an actual trade agreement is, optimistically, more than a year away.

By creating the Free Trade Area of the Americas, the United States and our hemispheric neighbors have a historic opportunity to shape open markets for our collective benefit. The 34 trade ministers meeting this week in Miami can play a pivotal role in moving the process forward. They must focus on the prosperity that an integrated hemispheric market could ultimately bring to each nation and work constructively through the disagreements that naturally exist.

The reality is that the worldalready is globalizing. No one can turn back that tide. Nor should they want to. Our best hope is to prepare for the inevitable future -- and do so before our economies are pounded by other trading blocs and low-cost China.

We welcome discussion on how best to do so by all sides. Free speech is alive and well in Miami, and we should see it in many peaceful debates and demonstrations this week. It will include, for example, the participation for the first time of civil-society groups as a part of the official FTAA conference. The meeting also will be an opportunity for Miami to shine and remind visiting dignitaries of how good it would be for an FTAA headquarters to be located here, if there were to be an FTAA agreement -- even though site selection isn't a central focus of this week's agenda.

Ideally the FTAA could spur economic growth throughout the hemisphere. Industries and firms with strong competitive advantages would have ample opportunities to profit from access to the world's largest open marketplace: More than 800 million people in 34 countries, from Canada's Northwest Territories to Argentina's Patagonia.

The FTAA would offer poor countries the opportunity to prosper from exports and foreign investments. U.S. consumers would benefit from cheaper goods and new trade-related jobs. The FTAA could raise living standards throughout the region as well as improve health, labor and environmental protections.

To realize that vision, however, ministerial negotiators will have to work hard to reconcile some very tough issues. Brazil, for example, looks favorably on trade talks, but prefers first to form a South American trading bloc that could then negotiate more forcefully with the United States. We believe this means that Brazil would support an FTAA, but not for many years yet. If that happens, it would leave in question whether the FTAA is an idea whose time has come -- or still is years away from arriving.

In any case, letting go of protectionist policies, reconciling differences in policies and priorities, gaining consensus on rules and standards will require tough decisions for all the countries involved. As is the nature of every free-trade deal, there will be FTAA winners and losers. Ultimately, any FTAA agreement should ensure that long-term benefits will outweigh individual losses.

This week, negotiators should push closer to that goal. Perhaps the biggest hurdle would be agricultural subsidies. Brazil, South America's biggest economy, is pushing for the United States to lower farm subsidies and cut anti-dumping rules against below-cost imports. The United States eventually may have to phase out such supports, but how it does so is critical.

Nearly all governments protect agriculture in one form or another. More than 110 countries produce sugar, all with some government assistance, for example -- and very little of it is traded on the open market. For one region to try to resolve this alone would only create new market distortions and inequities. Thus, reducing farm subsidies should be thrashed out in the World Trade Organization, as U.S. negotiators argue.

Florida's citrus industry, which generates 90,000 jobs and a $9 billion economic impact for the state, also makes a compelling argument for anti-monopoly measures. Brazil's citrus industry, which is controlled by five big processors, is the low-cost producer. Together the two produce 85 percent of the world's orange juice. Without some protection, Florida citrus could be put out of business; and Brazilian producers could gain a worldwide monopoly. That would eliminate competition and thus harm consumers.

Trade ministers aren't likely to resolve these and other thorny issues this week, but they should focus on areas amenable to agreement, such as anti-corruption rules, and push the FTAA process forward. Otherwise, U.S. negotiators may turn to subregional trade deals to the detriment of those countries left out.

• Provide mechanisms to soften the blow for workers and industries that might be adversely affected.

• Promote modern, effective business practices and strengthen behaviors that spur long-term economic health: property rights, investor rights, health and labor standards, environmental protections and judicial systems that effectively enforce the rule of law.

• Discourage bureaucratic red tape that fosters corruption and prevents fair competition.

• Not allow foreign-investor rights to inhibit national, state and provincial authorities from protecting human health and the environment.

Even if these ideas are achievable, it should be remembered that no trade agreement can be a cure-all for poverty and social ills. Each government would still have to craft the right policies and institutions to leverage the wealth created by commerce into healthy economic development.

Hugo Chavez wants none of this. He has a plan too. His Marxist vision is coming into direct conflict with democracy in this hemisphere.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez (L) embraces a Bolivian high school student wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt as Evo Morales (R), Bolivian congressman and Indian leader, accompanies him in the Alternative Social Encounter, in the Ramon Tahuichi soccer stadium in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia, November 15, 2003. The Encounter brought together thousands of union leaders and international activists to discuss the country's social and political crisis, in a meeting parallel to the 13th Ibero-American presidential summit held here from November 14-15. REUTERS/David Mercado

Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, center, Cuba's Vice President Carlos Lage, left, and Bolivian coca growers leader Evo Morales, center, participate at the closing ceremony of the alternative Social meeting of Bolivian Social Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, Saturday, Nov. 15, 2003. Indigenous workers and other leaders was holding their own meetings simultaneously with the XIII Iberoamerican Summit of leaders. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)

The Daily Telegraph - Revealed: The South American Connection (Terrorists)***To the north, on the man-made lake behind the Itaipu dam, smugglers skirt occasional Brazilian police vessels as they carry marijuana and cocaine by boat from Paraguay to Brazil and ship stolen vehicles back in the opposite direction. The money generated is near-impossible to calculate. Argentine officials believe that the figure for all cross-border transactions in the area could be $70 million (£44 million) each day.

Much of the business - legal and illegal - is controlled by a population of 30,000, mainly Shia Muslim Arabs who fled the Lebanese civil war. They run their enterprises from the shabby shopping malls and chaotic streets of Ciudad del Este but usually live in the more affluent Foz. Among them is a small but dedicated hardcore of militant Muslims. For years, often under the guise of charitable donations, millions of dollars have flowed from the Triple Frontier to Hizbollah, the Iranian-backed militant Lebanese Shi'ite faction. Money was also raised for Hamas, the Palestinian extremist group.

Despite a limited crackdown and handful of arrests by the Paraguayan authorities, David Aufhauser, the outgoing United States Treasury Department official on terrorist funding, last month described the Triple Frontier zone as home to a "rich marriage of drugs and terror". A senior US State Department official said: "In terms of terrorist financing, the area is a black hole."

The money trail is complex and difficult to trace but The Telegraph has learnt that American intelligence officials have electronically monitored cash transfers via banks in Sao Paulo and North America to a web of accounts in the Middle East linked to Hizbollah and Hamas. They also disclosed that the US has been using satellites to monitor telephone conversations in the area after learning that Middle East terror suspects were dialling so-called switching stations in Foz or Ciudad del Este and giving a password to have their calls re-routed to their destination.

The procedure made calls impossible to trace and avoided triggering interception mechanisms. More than a dozen switching stations have been found and closed down in recent months. To the frustration of the US, cracking down on the terror financing operations has been much more difficult, especially as Paraguay and Brazil want to resuscitate tourism at the falls and to avoid losing the Arabs' business acumen.

Corruption is rampant and financial controls have been lax for so long that they verge on the non-existent. Money-laundering is conducted through myriad front companies, under-invoicing is endemic and the plethora of foreign exchange offices, money-wiring companies and commercial banks offer ample scope for moving large sums unnoticed.

A recent Brazilian customs investigation indicated the scale of illicit financial movements through the Triple Frontier. It concluded that between 1996 and 2000, an estimated $35 billion (£22 billion) had been moved illegally from Brazilian accounts held in Foz via a Paraguayan bank in neighbouring Ciudad del Este to New York. "It is easy to understand Ciudad del Este," said a lawyer there. "All you need to know is that everyone here is a bandit."***

Insight Magazine via Front Page Magazine - Venezuela's Gathering Marxist Storm - Who Is Protecting Hugo Chavez? ***Last year a popular but disorganized opposition movement in Venezuela threatened the government of Hugo Chavez, the self-styled populist who has taken that nation's battered political economy on a strange journey into social chaos after gaining power in 1999. In March of last year, Insight predicted the ouster of Chavez and he was forced out of office. But a bizarre combination of factors returned this protégé of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro to power.

More than a year later, experts on Latin America tell this magazine that Washington's soft line on Chavez in Venezuela adversely is affecting U.S. security and the stability of the entire region. This hands-off policy toward Chavez seems to originate from the highest levels of the Bush administration, these foreign-policy specialists say, and has evolved to the point of negligence of a crisis that already constitutes the greatest threat to regional stability since Castro took power in Cuba in 1959. Indeed, even as Congress has been intent upon removing travel restrictions to Castro's island prison, say these regional specialists, the Cuban leader is working with Chavez to destabilize governments in the region.

A senior U.S. official who worked in Venezuela during the rise of Chavez speaks with grudging admiration of the Venezuelan leader's classic Marxist-Leninist approach to expanding power: two steps forward, one step back. "Chavez is constantly underestimated by people who do not understand his patient, methodical approach to recruiting and strategy," says this retired Army officer. "Chavez never provokes the U.S. or other nations, but instead works obliquely to erode the position of his enemies."

As an example of Chavez's successful approach, the official cites U.S. Ambassador to the Organization of American States (OAS) John Maisto, a former ambassador to Venezuela and Nicaragua. He reports that Maisto was the chief exponent of what the source calls the absurd argument that Chavez is a democrat at heart and that the United States should not "push" Chavez into the arms of Castro. "Maisto did the same thing in Nicaragua," says the official, "until Washington lit a fire under him." In fact, this observer says, Chavez has been a radical all his life, influenced by Marxist and authoritarian political theorists, and has been expanding his influence in the region using his links to Cuba and terrorist groups in the Middle East [see "Fidel May Be Part of Terror Campaign," Dec. 3, 2001, and "Fidel's Successor in Latin America," April 30, 2001]. ***

Hugo Chavez - Venezuela

Hyde Proposes Commonwealth of Americas, Urges Closer Political, Economic&SecurityTies in Hemisphere

Hyde, chairman of the House International Relations Committee, made the remarks at Ft. Benning, GA. to the first graduating class of the Democratic Sustainment Course.

A complete text of Hyde’s speech:

Thank you for the opportunity to speak to the graduating class of the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.

This Institute has a broad and important mandate: to train soldiers, law enforcement officers, and civilians from the Western Hemisphere to enhance security in their countries and the region as a whole, while also strengthening democracy, deepening the rule of law, and safeguarding human rights. This mission is in keeping with the very real challenges we face in the 21st Century: peacekeeping, resolving border conflicts peacefully, responding to natural disasters, and – as ideological conflict has given way to new threats – combating the illicit drug trade and international criminal organizations.

Today, I would like to address the future of our hemisphere. This is fitting because you, as professional soldiers, law enforcement officials, and civilian leaders, have an important role to play in seeing that this vision becomes a reality.

The United States is a global power, with global interests and responsibilities. Given this open-ended outlook, it is not surprising that our attention is thinly spread and easily captured by the many pressing problems of the world. At times it seems that the United States has become the world’s fire brigade, racing from one alarm to another, battling an unending series of conflagrations in far-off places, with most of the other countries watching it all from the sidelines. Whatever its merits, this ad hoc approach comes at a great cost: our agenda is shaped more by a scattered, reflexive response to the latest problems than by a conscious effort to shape events in pursuit of our long-term interests.

This certainly has been the case with Latin America, which has long been relegated to the periphery of U.S. foreign policy. Despite this inattention, it will come as a surprise to many that the United States has been presented with an opportunity of enormous consequence: to bring into being a permanent zone of peace, prosperity, and security throughout the entire Western Hemisphere, a self-sustaining equilibrium that could well become a model for the rest of the world. This initiative could rightly be termed the Commonwealth of the Americas.

This is not a utopian vision; much of the foundation for this Commonwealth has already been laid, the product of several decades of effort that extends to virtually every country in North and South America. Its most prominent achievements include the spread of democracy, the embrace of free markets, the defeat of communism and other threats to freedom, and a growing recognition that the interests of individual countries are best advanced through cooperation and an openness to the world. Despite their undoubted benefits, however, these accomplishments have no guarantee of permanence. In fact, many are under threat even as we speak. If they are to be made lasting, if their promise is to be fully realized, we must seize this historic opportunity to reshape our hemisphere and preserve its blessings indefinitely.

For the United States, establishing an overall objective of securing this hemispheric Commonwealth would allow us to weave together and give focus to our current assemblage of individual policies toward the region. But the United States is only one part of the necessary equation: the prerequisite for the Commonwealth is a recognition by all of the countries of the hemisphere that each shares a common interest in the well-being and security of the region and that each country must shoulder its share of the responsibility for sustaining these.

The idea of collective responsibility will sound new to some ears due to the old stereotype of a powerful U.S. imposing its will on the smaller states to its south. The truth, however, is that the U.S. now is as much acted upon as acting. Let me cite one example: the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). This historic agreement committed Mexico, the U.S., and Canada to the creation of a continental economy, one with far-reaching effects beyond the purely economic. I believe this agreement is very much in the long-term interests of the United States. However, and contrary to the popular imaginings, NAFTA was not a U.S. initiative, but a Mexican one, not a U.S. device to exploit Mexico but an embrace sought by Mexico to advance its entry into the modern world. It represents a long-delayed recognition that the interests of both Mexico and the U.S. are best advanced through cooperation and that the distance and hostility that have characterized our relations for two centuries have imposed great costs on both countries.

I cite the NAFTA both as a model for a broader cooperation and also to emphasize that every country has a role to play in setting the common agenda. That agenda may contain many things, but I believe that its core should center on promoting economic opportunity, security, and political freedom throughout the hemisphere.

Economic Opportunity

Our hopes for this hemisphere rest upon the economic advancement of all. Fortunately, our prospects are quite positive: during the 1990s, almost every country in our region embraced the free market and implemented a far-reaching series of economic reforms, thereby laying the foundation for sustained growth. We are only at the beginning of that process, however. Too many people in this rich hemisphere remain poor; too many are denied access to opportunities to better their lot and that of their families.

There are many obstacles that need to be overcome, and every country has an unfinished agenda. But one easy way to expand economic opportunity for every country in this hemisphere is to remove our antiquated and self-limiting barriers to trade. This is what the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) represents: the recognition that protectionism is a dead-end street and that the economic interests of each country are best advanced through cooperation and an openness to the world.

President Bush has rightly made the FTAA the centerpiece of U.S. policy towards the hemisphere, but it faces many hurdles, especially in the U.S. We are in the ironic situation that the greatest advocates of this agreement are the countries of Central and South America which formerly blockaded themselves against virtually every U.S. proposal for expanded cooperation. Now it is they who are knocking on our door, preaching the benefits of cooperation, only to be met by repeated delays and excuses on our part. I believe that, ultimately, good sense will prevail in the U.S. and the FTAA will have a belated birth, but it will not be an easy fight.

Security

The defeat of the Soviet Union freed the world from a malevolent force that was the enemy of freedom everywhere. Today, our hemisphere is confronted with other formidable threats. Chief among them is the drug trade because the criminal empire behind it has joined forces with armed insurgencies in a number of areas. In the Andes there is the unsettling prospect of democratically elected governments being overcome by challenges too great for its resources to handle. But an even more disturbing scenario is that of criminal organizations freeing themselves from the restraints of government altogether, becoming masters in their own territory and virtually sovereign actors in the world. Can any government, any person in our hemisphere not regard that prospect as frightening?

Many believe that the drug trade is the United States’ problem because we are the principal consumers. But the belief that other countries can serve merely as transit routes, and perhaps even profit from doing so while remaining untouched, is a great error. Everywhere the drug trade produces massive corruption, cultivates violence, undermines the authority of governments, bankrolls insurgencies, and eventually turns its malevolent focus on the local population.

I cite the drug problem as one that requires cooperation throughout the region, but I could list many others as well. Given that cooperation, even a goal as ambitious as making war impossible in our hemisphere is within our grasp, beginning with the renunciation of all territorial claims by one state against any other. Similarly, preventing the intrusion of any outside power requires only a common determination on our part. But the content of any list is less important than the recognition that the establishment of a secure environment throughout the entire hemisphere is a responsibility shared by every country in the region. Once that is secured, everything else becomes possible.

Political Freedom

Political freedom, prosperity, and security are all related; each requires the others if it is to be fully realized and made secure.

The 1990s witnessed great strides forward for democracy in the hemisphere. But even as we celebrate this enormous progress, we recognize that it is threatened in many areas. Those threats come from many sources, both internal and external.

While we must respect the right of countries to determine their own course through democratic means, we cannot accept the overthrow of democracy or the suppression of human rights in any of them, however pressing the emergency. We have a collective responsibility to oppose the seizure of power in any country by anyone, especially by the unelected and the self-appointed, and also to ensure that human rights are fully respected in practice as well as on paper.

But political freedom consists of more than simply free elections, although these are its indispensable precondition; and liberty is more than a series of grand pronouncements. Political freedom cannot be a grant of government, to be limited or withdrawn altogether when those in power see fit to do so. To be secure, it must exist as a permanent right and rest upon institutions of civil society that are sufficiently robust to be able to withstand any adverse pressure from the government.

That brings me to the role of U.S. assistance. The U.S. does have a role to play in promoting prosperity, security, and political freedom throughout the hemisphere, one we share with every other country. But that aid must be formulated in the recognition that the responsibility for promoting these benefits lies with the individual countries and societies, and that all the aid in the world cannot substitute for their indifference. Given that understanding, any assistance we provide should be aimed at promoting the private sector and strengthening the institutions of civil society, without which there can be no stable democracy or economic progress.

Conclusion

Following Columbus’ accidental discovery of our continents, the Old World of Europe was transformed by the wealth found here and further enriched by the dreams these new lands made possible. Among the greatest gifts this New World held was the promise of a new beginning, one unencumbered by the oppression, the rigid structures, the limitations of the Old. In this new land, the dead hand of the past could be thrown off and possibilities that appeared utopian in their homeland could here be made real.

In many ways, we have lived up to that hope, but much remains to be accomplished before this hemisphere’s promise is fully realized. The first step in that process is to recognize that our fates are joined together. The second is a commitment to act together to make real the opportunity that lies before us: to bring into being the Commonwealth of the Americas and to make of our hemisphere a New World for all the ages to come.

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