MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Unasur Foreign Affairs ministers meet in Buenos Aires to address global crisis

Maria Emma Mejía will be presiding over the deliberations

The Union of South American Nations, (Unasur) Foreign Affairs ministers’ council will be holding on Wednesday an extraordinary summit in Buenos Aires to address several issues related to last week’s meeting of Unasur Finance ministers.

Among the issues is the assessment of a joint political position to face the international crisis and the possibility of an electoral instance inside the group.

More specifically the ministers from the 12-country member organization will work on how to implement the recommendations adopted by Finance ministers last week in Buenos Aires, basically several measures to boost the defence of the region in the face of the global crisis.

Finance ministers had suggested three main venues: increasing inter-region trade; using local currencies in trade and compensation operations and the consolidation of a joint fund with contributions from the central banks of each country member to help reduce dependency from international credit and to address balance of payments attacks.

“Foreign Affairs ministers will debate the outline of the three task groups in the framework of Unasur and agree on consensus tools to advance measures which enable the group to address the current international crisis, estimated to be long term”, points out a release from the Argentine government.

Furthermore the ministerial council will continue working in the creation of mechanisms which deepen regional unity, with “an electoral instance” to help address the “concrete problems which emerge from the integration process of the twelve countries of the group”, adds the text.

All these issues will begin to be addressed Tuesday in the Unasur council of delegates.
Unasur Secretary General Colombian-born Maria Emma Mejia arrived on Sunday to Argentina to be present at this week’s events.

Unasur is made up of Argentina, Bolivia, Brasil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Surinam, Uruguay and Venezuela.