Andean and Chilean Foreign Ministers, in Santiago
Create Joint Commission to define the scope of Chile’s participation in the CAN, as an Associate Member

Santiago, Chile, Nov. 24, 2006.- The Andean Community – Chile Joint Commission was created today to define, within a period of 180 days, the scope of Chile’s participation as an Associate Member Country, both in the CAN’s bodies and institutions and in the mechanisms and measures of the Cartagena Agreement. 

The Establishing Act of the CAN – Chile Joint Commission was signed by the Foreign Ministers of the CAN countries, on the one hand, and the Chilean Foreign Minister, on the other, at a special ceremony held today in Santiago, Chile, during the Third Meeting of Foreign Ministers of the South American Community of Nations. 

The Foreign Ministers agreed to consider this Act a “political event of the greatest importance,” constituting, as it does, a significant step toward Chile’s association with the CAN, in a process started last September, when the Ministers of Foreign Affairs and of Foreign Trade gave Chile the status of Associate Member.

The CAN’s Secretary General, Alfredo Fuentes Hernández, underscored the importance of this Act, because --he stated--“it opens the way to an effort, over the next three months, at rapprochement between the Andean Community countries and Chile that will not only strengthen the historical and cultural ties of long standing between our nations, but will also benefit Andean and South American integration.” 

As the Establishing Agreement specifies, the Joint Commission will undertake to define, within a period of 180 days, the terms for Chile’s participation in the bodies and institutions of the Andean Integration System and in the mechanisms and measures of the Cartagena Agreement, and the legislation that will be applied to its relations with the CAN Member Countries, as well as the way those relations will be managed. 

The Joint Commission will hold at least two meetings between January and May 2007 and its conclusions will be adopted by the CAN countries and Chile to reach a final decision on the matter no later than May 24th of next year.  

In addition, the Andean and Chilean Foreign Ministers authorized the CAN – Chilean Joint Commission to take charge, with the support of the CAN General Secretariat, of the formation of Ad-Hoc Working Groups made up of high-level technicians from the Andean Community Member Countries and the Republic of Chile and of the methodology they will use.