After meeting Monday with members of a Chinese delegation who are in Montevideo since Saturday, Uruguayan Foreign Minister Francisco Bustillo said he hoped the other members of Mercosur would soon join the Free Trade Agreement negotiations because the Asian giant was “open to cooperation both with Mercosur and with the particular member country.”
The Government of Uruguay Thursday refrained from signing the joint document penned at the Mercosur Summit in Asunción, on the grounds that it lacked any mention of flexibilization, which the Luis Lacalle Pou administration needs to broker one-on-one deals with other blocs or countries or blocs of the block.
The governments of all four members of Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay) Wednesday agreed in Asunción to lower the bloc's common external tariffs (CET) by 10%.
Although Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro is not attending the Mercosur summit in Paraguay, his administration continues with its policy of unilaterally reducing the common external tariff. In this case Brazil's Foreign Trade Chamber Executive Committee approved the reduction of import tariffs on thirteen items, including medicines, medical equipment, printing ink and polypropylene resin. Tariffs were cut to zero or reduced to 2%, from 2% and 6,5%.
The Port of Rio Grande in the Brazilian southernmost state of Rio Grande do sul, will have continuous dredging of its access channel. The decision follows strong long-standing demand from operators and the fact that the main maritime port terminal in the state of Rio Grande do Sul also has close links with the three other Mercosur member countries, Paraguay, Argentina and Uruguay.
Josep Borrell, the European Union's top diplomat, has said Latin America would host a CELAC meeting sometime next year, but admitted that ratifying the 2019 trade agreement with Mercosur was “a more complicated issue.”
Peruvian President Pedro Castillo Terrones' approval ratings fell yet again, according to an Ipsos survey released Sunday by the Lima newspaper El Comercio. Meanwhile, 79% of Peruvians also disapproved of the management of Congress, the study showed.
Argentina's Foreign Ministry Friday issued a statement according to which Uruguay's negotiations with China towards a Free Trade Agreement must go through Mercosur.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro Thursday said he had “the solution” to the armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine and vowed to discuss it with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky.
Uruguayan President Luis Lacalle Pou Wednesday announced negotiations with China to reach a bilateral free trade agreement are to begin, after technical teams from the two countries found it feasible, it was reported in Montevideo.