CAN Secretary General, Guillermo Fernández de Soto had the following to say, on evaluating the results of the recent Andean Community – MERCOSUR ministerial meeting, held to evaluate the status of negotiations to reach a free trade agreement between the two groups:

1. The meeting between the two blocs opened up a new political scenario for concluding the negotiation of a Free Trade Agreement in the terms of Economic Complementarity Agreement Nº 56, signed in December 2002.

2. A positive change in the way relations are conducted between the Andean Community and MERCOSUR was reflected in the constructive spirit in which the meeting took place, the Andean Community’s capacity for proposal and the final document of the declaration. 

3. The political will of the Andean Community and MERCOSUR governments to conclude the negotiations within the agreed timeframe –by December of this year at the MERCOSUR Summit in Montevideo-- was eloquently expressed.   

4. A very important rapprochement took place over how to resolve issues that have hampered the conclusion of the negotiations.  Today, CAN and MERCOSUR see more eye-to-eye on the areas with problems to be resolved and the proposals to be adopted.   

5. The negotiating methodology was made more transparent and the dominant spirit at the meeting was one of partners seeking to settle their differences realistically in order to move ahead with and conclude the negotiations.  The Andean Community’s proposal constituted eloquent proof of this new phase.   

6. It was fully agreed that South America’s integration goes beyond mere trade negotiations.  It must extend, as well, and multidimensionally, to issues such as political relations, democratic governance, physical integration, financial cooperation, environmental conservation, promotion of the competitiveness of production chains, and human development.   

7. The creation of a South American Space for Integration was considered an objective to be taken up and consolidated by the governments, and the conclusion of CAN-MERCOSUR trade negotiations a qualitative leap in constructing this aim.   

8. There was a greater understanding of the need to look to the cost of integration, above all for the intermediate and less developed countries.   

On concluding, the Secretary General stressed that Andean integration had been proposed from the very beginning as part of a process encompassing all of Latin America that would, by drawing on the store of community wealth, make it possible to build a South American space and disembark at different, yet complementary, platforms.   

Lima, August 7, 2003.