MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Bachelet seeks more integration

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet yesterday told Argentine lawmakers that the two nations that were on the brink of war in 1978 when both were ruled by military dictatorships now need to bury past differences and work toward greater regional economic and political integration.

Chile's first female President was in Argentina on her first foreign trip since taking power on March 11, meeting with fellow left-leaning President Néstor Kirchner and touring a government-funded low-income housing project.

Speaking to a joint session of the Lower House and the Senate before wrapping up a two-day visit en route to Uruguay, Bachelet declared that adversarial relations between the two neighbours are a thing of the past.

??As Argentines and Chileans, we must stop looking at each other as adversaries and learn to look to each other as colleagues and friends,'' she said to applause from the lawmakers.

Chile and Argentina have warily monitored each other across their Andean mountain border for many years and nearly went to war in December 1978 over their southern boundary in the remote tip of Patagonia, but the conflict was avoided thanks to the intervention of the then Pope John Paul II.

In the 1982 war between Argentina and Britain over the British-controlled Malvinas islands, then Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet formally declared neutrality, but later disclosures showed Chilean intelligence had provided key information to Britain, whose aircraft were given permission to make emergency landings in Chilean territory.

Bachelet, whose centre-left coalition has governed Chile since the Pinochet years, was warmly embraced by Kirchner as they appeared at the home-building project. Kirchner welcomed her with a sizable delegation, and both expressed desires to end poverty and bolster their democracies.

Bachelet toured a kindergarten renamed in honour of Chile's then socialist president Salvador Allende, who is generally believed to have committed suicide during the 1973 military coup staged by Pinochet.

She also signed accords for expanded trade and raised the sensitive issue of future Argentine supplies of natural gas to Chile for power generation and industrial uses.

Bachelet said she and Kirchner had agreed to continue a binational commission studying ways to ensure future provisions of Argentine natural gas to Chile's robust free market-oriented economy. Chile depends almost entirely on the gas imported from Argentina, but there have been supply problems due to growing consumption and reduced reserves in Argentina.

??We are going to work very hard on the energy issue,'' said Bachelet.

In April, 2004, Argentina restricted natural gas supplies to Chile while giving priority to Argentine domestic consumption ahead of the peak winter months. Chilean authorities bristled at the time and said they had to resort to other, more expensive, fuels to supply electric power plants and industries.(BAH)