President Evo Morales said on Thursday that Repsol and the other multinational companies operating in Bolivia should not fear nationalization since his government only appeals to that extreme when corporations think in ‘looting’ instead of investing.
Bolivia will again belong to the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs after its bid to rejoin with a reservation that it does not accept the treaty’s requirement that “coca leaf chewing must be banned” was successful Friday. Opponents needed one-third of the 184 signatory countries to object, but fell far, far short despite objections by the US and the International Narcotics Control Board.
Presidents, Foreign ministers and representatives from 22 Latinamerican and Caribbean countries stamped their signatures to a declaration stating their commitment in support of Venezuela and its institutions in the international stage.
Bolivian president Evo Morales subscribed on Friday the Mercosur incorporation protocol which makes it the sixth member of the regional group. The event took place in Brasilia during the Mercosur summit hosted by Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff.
Argentine President Cristina Fernandez criticized international organizations which she described as ‘predators’ and called for the region to create its own mechanisms to settle litigations among South American countries.
Bolivia will announce to its peers at the Mercosur summit in Brasilia, later this week that it is willing to adhere to the trade block as a full member, reported Amanda Dávila, Communications minister.
The Mercosur summit which meets this week, December 6/7 in Brasilia is scheduled to debate the incorporation of Ecuador and Bolivia to the regional block which earlier this year, after waiting since 2006 finally integrated Venezuela as full member.
Bolivia accepted the official invitation to become full member of Mercosur and hopes to sign the first accords during the coming summit of the block in early December in Brasilia, said President Evo Morales.
Bolivia asked visiting Oscar-winner Sean Penn Tuesday to help lobby for La Paz to regain a bit of Pacific coast, and escape the ranks of landlocked states. Evo Morales, the populist president of the arid nation high in the Andes, asked the US actor to help its campaign to press Chile to overhaul treaties that ended a 19th-century war that cost Bolivia its coast and gave the land to Chile.
Bolivia returned on Monday to global credit markets for the first time in almost a century with the launch of 500 million worth of 10-year bonds, reflecting investors' confidence.