MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Bolivia supports Mexican candidate for OAS chair.

Bolivian Foreign Affairs minister Juan Ignacio Siles said his country could not support a Chilean candidate for the post of Secretary General of the Organization of American States, OAS, because it could be harmful to its country's maritime claims.

According to Mr. Siles although the OAS Secretary General can't determine agenda issues of the 34 countries organization, "there are other ways of influencing issues and how they are addressed".

However Mr. Siles whose country supports Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez for the post made it quiet clear that Bolivia is involved in a campaign "to promote a candidate and not to discredit another candidate".

"We're campaigning for Mr. Derbez because we believe he's a consensus candidate who will have no difficulties in advancing an OAS reform process, and definitively we're not against Chilean candidate Mr. Miguel Angel Insulza", underlined the Bolivian official, who also announced the coming visit to La Paz of the third, and US sponsored, candidate former El Salvador president Francisco Flores.

In a recent statement Mr. Flores said if he was elected to the OAS chair, Bolivia and Chile would have "equal consideration".

Bolivia has sea access claims over current Chilean territory, dating back to 1879 when together with Peru they were defeated by Chile. Following the end of the armed conflict Chile incorporated Bolivia's sea access condemning the country to be landlocked, and also held on to a small portion of Peruvian territory.

Bolivia has never accepted the situation and repeatedly claims sovereign sea access.