Ecuador’s President elect expresses his support for Andean integration

Lima, Dec. 10, 2002. Lucio Gutiérrez, Ecuador’s President elect, at the ceremony held during his visit to the Andean Community General Secretariat, expressed his support for the Andean integration process and stated his hope that “the integration effort would soon benefit the poorest in the subregion”.

Guillermo Fernández de Soto, the CAN Secretary General, presided over the ceremony, which was attended by the Ecuadorian Ambassador, members of that country’s delegation and officials of the Andean organization.

The President elect of Ecuador renewed his “faith” in the work being advanced by the Andean integration movement and his conviction that “the solution to many of our countries’ problems definitely lies in integration.”

“If we integrate, our work will be much easier. If we do not, globally, the task ahead will be impossible,” Gutiérrez stated.

The Andean Community Secretary General, for his part, emphasized his agreement with President Lucio Gutiérrez’s vision, in the sense that “integration has ceased to be a purely commercial process to become an imperative of political integration on all fronts.”

“We are extremely pleased that this new comprehensive approach, this multidimensional agenda that we have had the chance to explain to you coincides with that vision,” he stressed.

Fernández de Soto offered the government that Lucio Gutiérrez will head the General Secretariat’s support to in working “toward this new vision.” “Major challenges, great opportunities, lie ahead of us: Working to build our countries’ competitive position, working to eliminate and to reduce the levels of poverty,” he pointed out.

“We must build up our democracy, which is the essential value, the supreme value that has identified the integration process ever since we signed our own democratic clause as a means to reinforce that value which identifies us fully,” he underscored.

The CAN Secretary General met with Ecuador’s President elect and the members of his delegation in a private session during which he had the opportunity to explain the strategic vision on which the CAN is working for its efforts of the next few years.

- Photographs of the visit by Ecuador’s President elect, Lucio Gutiérrez, to the headquarters of the Andean Community General Secretariat.