MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

UNASUR suggests Venezuelan chancellor meets Colombian president Santos

With Uribe stepping down, normalization could follow with Santos

Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) Secretary-General Néstor Kirchner and Brazilian president Lula da Silva recommended that Venezuelan Foreign Affairs minister Nicolas Maduro should travel to Colombia on Saturday to attend the swearing-in ceremony of president elect Juan Manuel Santos.

The two leaders who spent several hours discussing the issue with Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez in Caracas believe this is a first strong step to help solve the bilateral crisis between the neighbouring Andean countries.

Sources from the Argentine delegation confirmed the decision was the result of last night's (Thursday) meeting and of the gathering held Friday morning, which was also attended by Lula da Silva, before all three participated of the South America-Africa Summit.

Kirchner spoke before the plenary of the Summit and assured he “brings the mandates of the region's presidents to integrate ourselves strongly and work towards cooperation with Africa.”

“We must arrive there with clear institutional answers and economic, educative, and cultural integration in order to generate an alternative that would allow us to speak to the world from a different relationship of power,” he added, “because the right to grow, to educational training, to the distribution of income and strong investments is a right to which no one should surrender.”

After Kirchner's words, Brazil's Lula da Silva assured it was time “to achieve the integration of the peoples of Africa and Latin America.”

“Africa and Latin America are regions that for centuries did not have the right to elaborate or define their own policies, because we were colonies for a long time” Lula da Silva underlined.

Venezuelan head of state, Hugo Chávez, also spoke and offered up a summary of the history of his country. He also made reference to Lula da Silva and Kirchner's time in office, and said: “Without the arrival of the two of you, it wouldn't have been possible to continue paving the way and for each peoples to awaken, until we reached the creation of the UNASUR.”

Late afternoon Kirchner and Lula da Silva were scheduled to travel to Bogotá for the swearing-in ceremony of Colombian President-elect Juan Manuel Santos.