MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Ecuadorian President skipping Celac Summit

The presence of Presidents Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Nicolás Maduro among others is yet to be confirmed

Less than a week before the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac) Summit is to be held in Buenos Aires, the President of Ecuador announced he shall not be attending the event hosted by the country holding the pro-tempore presidency of the bloc.

 Argentina's ties with the Guillermo Lasso administration are going through a critical phase after the government of Alberto Fernández granted political asylum to María de los Ángeles Duarte Pesantes, a former minister under President Rafael Correa who has been sentenced to 8 years in prison for corruption and has been sheltering at the Argentine embassy in Quito.

Tension with Mexico started after President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) failed to endorse Fernández's candidate for President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) - Cecilia Todesca Bocco - and the Brazilian Ilan Goldfajn was elected.

Despite the current political crisis in Brazil, President Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva has confirmed his presence in Buenos Aires, marking the largest South American country's return to the organization which groups almost every member of the Organization of American States (OAS) except for the United States and Canada, but with the presence of Cuba.

Under former President Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil pulled out from Celac and from the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) and joined the Forum for the Progress of South America (Prosur).

Cuban and Venezuelan authorities have also expressed their concern that the United States might request the seizure by Argentina's judiciary of the aircraft carrying their officials to the Summit, it was reported by Clarín citing an alleged statement from Havana and Caracas

Following the measures taken against a Boeing 747-300 freighter formerly owned by Iran's Mahan Air and transferred to Venezuela's Emtrasur, which was on a US no-fly list, meaning it is banned from overflying the country where it was built, for its alleged involvement in terrorist activities.

Presidents Miguel Díaz-Canel and Nicolás Maduro would be arriving in Buenos Aires aboard aircraft belonging to the Venezuelan Consortium of Aeronautical Industries and Air Services (Conviasa), Emtrasur's mother company. Conviasa is sanctioned by the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States for allegedly being part of a corruption scheme set up by the Venezuelan government.

Díaz-Canel's presence in Buenos Aires was confirmed by diplomatic sources later Tuesday but Maduro's plans are yet to be announced.

Meanwhile, in Buenos Aires, former Security Minister Patricia Bullrich, who chairs the opposition PRO party, the largest member of the Together for Change (Juntos por el Cambio - JxC) alliance and plans to run for president this year, has launched an initiative to protest against the presence in Argentina of foreign rulers regarded as undemocratic.

“We want an Argentina free of dictators!,” Bullrich said while opposing the presence in Buenos Aires of Presidents Maduro, Díaz-Canel, and Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega. “Let's all say NO together to the 'visit' of autocratic presidents,” Bullrich said.

“The government of inept and infamous presided by Alberto Fernández has invited Maduro, Ortega, and Díaz Canel to Argentina. I absolutely repudiate any entry of dictators into our country. Their mere presence is an insult to democracy and to our National Constitution,” JxC Congressman Ricardo López Murphy said while submitting a draft declaration for the Lower House expressing his “deep concern” over the official invitation to the “top leaders of dictatorial regimes that violate the human rights of their respective peoples.”

Liberal Congressman José Luis Espert went a step further and wants these leaders to be declared “personae non gratae.”

“Argentina is a democratic and republican country, and there is no debate in society that makes us think that we should change. The real debate is to be able to improve the quality of life of Argentines,” Espert insisted while recalling on social media that Venezuela had been suspended as a full member of Mercosur for breaking the democratic order “in accordance with the provisions of Article 4 and second paragraph of Article 5 of the Ushuaia Protocol.”