MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Ambitious agenda for EU/Latam summit with 53 leaders

Peru is hosting the fifth European Union/Latinamerica/Caribbean leaders' summit and has displayed 85.000 police and Armed Forces in the capital Lima, of which 6.000 in the immediate area where deliberations will take place. The event begins next Tuesday and concludes Friday with the leaders summit.

Over the weekend police began mapping traffic detours and road blocks and requesting neighbours from the restricted areas to register in their local stations so they can be extended free circulation passes. Fifty-three leaders from Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, including Germany's Angela Merkel UK's Gordon Brown, French president Nicholas Sarkozy and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, have confirmed their attendance at the May 16-17 summit which is to address an ambitious agenda: poverty, inequality and inclusion and sustainable development; environment, climate change and energy. On Tuesday and Wednesday the different delegations will deliberate and try to hammer out a blueprint which will then be debated on Thursday by the Foreign Affairs ministers and on Friday leaders will subscribe the Lima Declaration that will contain guidelines on poverty, environment and energy. However, other "unexpected" issues will also be included in the agenda, food shortages and prices and the ongoing conflict between Colombia and Ecuador over the rebel guerrilla FARC groups allegedly using sanctuaries in Ecuador, one of which was bombed and grazed by Colombian troops triggering a serious regional incident. Peruvian president Alan Garcia said that the coming EOU/Latinamerica summit had a special connotation since "ten years have elapsed since the beginning of the summits and this is an excellent opportunity to review of progress in the strategic association process and agreeing guidelines to continue strengthening those advances". The coordinator of the fifth summit Ambassador Hernan Couturier said that the objective of the meeting is "to establish cooperation programs between both regions, open markets, increase trade, promote investments, opening business opportunities for both sides" European leaders have said they hope to persuade Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, Mexico and others to join Europe in fighting climate change. The EU is also negotiating with several South and Central American trade blocs and is likely to use the summit to advance trade negotiations. Peru has proposed its own independent, free-trade pact with the EU, excluding other members of the Andean Community bloc, Ecuador and Bolivia, whose politics it says are holding up a trade deal. President Garcia has said he also plans to push for a limit on bio-fuels, which he says are boosting food prices by diverting farm products for fuel. On Saturday following the subscription of the Lima Declaration Mercosur leaders will meet with the EU counterparts, one of several mini summits in the framework of the event and taking advantage of the presence of 53 leaders. Police is also scheduled to provide security for an alternative "People's Summit," held by social, labor, and indigenous groups from May 13-16 in a working class Lima neighborhood, police chief Uribe said. Coordinator Miguel Palacio, an Indian activist, said Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa and Bolivian President Evo Morales plan to attend a closing rally that could draw 20,000 people. The first Latinamerica/Caribbean/EU summit was held in Rio do Janeiro in 1999 where it was agreed to hold it every two years. Madrid followed in 2002, Guadalajara, Mexico in 2004 and Vienna, 2006