Lima, July 25, 2006.- The Andean Community General Secretariat today, during a ceremonial session, rendered tribute to the President of Peru, Alejandro Toledo, and to the government team that participated in Andean Integration System organs, in recognition of their contribution to and strong support for the Andean integration process.

Andean Community Secretary General, Ambassador Allan Wagner Tizón, presided over the ceremony, which was attended by the Ambassadors of the CAN Member Countries, the Ministers of State of Peru, the Peruvian representatives to the Andean Integration System bodies, Councils and Sectoral Committees, and elected Andean Parliamentarians.

The CAN Secretary General, Ambassador Allan Wagner, underscored several examples of President Toledo’s fruitful involvement during his five years in office, which helped deepen the integration process, overcome the crisis produced by Venezuela’s withdrawal and bring about the stabilization of the process, which today is moving toward the launching of the Association Agreement negotiation with the EU this coming September.

“What better way to celebrate the birthday the Liberator, Simón Bolívar, and the Day of Andean Unity –commemorated yesterday-- than to render tribute to the President of Peru and to the team of people who contributed significantly during his term of office to boosting the Andean integration process, “ he exclaimed.

In citing the most important contributions made by President Toledo and his government team to the integration process, Wagner emphasized the leader’s initiative “to give Andean integration a human face,” which was embodied in the multidimensional agenda approved by the Andean leaders at the Quirama Summit and in the Integral Plan for Social Development and its 20 projects.

He also stressed that the Peru-Brazil Alliance promoted during Toledo’s government was the starting point for the South American Community of Nations, which was preceded by his initiative to speed up the CAN-MERCOSUR negotiations. “These are concrete achievements that, going beyond discourse, can be exhibited in terms of regional and Latin American –and not merely South American-- integration,” he pointed out.

Wagner concluded by underscoring the Community’s recent touchdown in Brussels in having completed the Joint Assessment that laid the groundwork for the soon-to-be-launched negotiation of an Association Agreement with the European Union and, at the same time, having formulated recommendations to deepen the Andean integration process.

These complex negotiations, initiated in the framework of the Vienna Summit, made it possible to maintain Andean unity and to stabilize the process which had been weakened by Venezuela’s withdrawal, Wagner remarked, as he hailed President Toledo with a “task accomplished.”

In expressing his appreciation for the tribute rendered to him, President Alejandro Toledo toted up the effects of his leadership on the progress of Andean integration and underscored his conviction that the social face of the Hemisphere can be changed for the better through integration and that public policies are meaningful only if economic growth improves the social face of our peoples.

In this connection, he proposed adopting the target of eliminating extreme poverty in fifteen years’ time –in 2021-- not only in Peru, but also in Colombia, Bolivia and Ecuador and in Latin America in general. “Let us reduce poverty from 48 to 24 percent in fifteen years. Let us give economic policy a human face. This means investing in health, education and, above all, decent work,“ he exclaimed.