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Speech by President Alberto
Fujimori Fujimori at the opening
ceremony of the Twelfth Andean
Presidential Council
Lima, June 9, 2000
Ladies and Gentlemen:
It
is truly an honor and, indeed, a
matter of understandable pleasure,
for us Peruvians to host all of
the Andean Presidents and their
distinguished retinues. As
Chairman of the Andean
Presidential Council and on behalf
of the people of Peru, I welcome
you most warmly to our country.
This
meeting of the Presidential
Council, the 12th, is, like its
predecessors, a reaffirmation of
faith in Andean unity –in other
words, faith in ourselves and in
the strength of our numbers.
Armed with this conviction of
purely Bolivarian inspiration, we
have jointly confronted more than
one challenge and overcome the
continuing threat of discord that
could have sent this integration
project to its destruction.
A
modern approach to Andean
integration identifies five main
lines of action, which I am going
to summarize for you.
First, the establishment of the
Andean Common Market by the year
2005, for which it is important to
first form the Andean Customs
Union and reach an agreement on
policies for macroeconomic
harmonization.
Second, the development and
activation of the common foreign
policy to give the Andean
Community an international
position in forums where our
objectives coincide.
Third, the development of common
Andean borders in order to
substantially improve the quality
of life in these regions and
facilitate international overland
traffic between Member countries.
Fourth, the rapid development of
the Common Market in Services for
the purpose of creating new
business, and consequently job,
opportunities.
And
last, the creation of mechanisms
for political and technical
cooperation in order to facilitate
the unimpeded circulation of
people within the Andean Community.
Acceleration of our integration on
all fronts will depend today, more
than ever, on the existence of a
sustained political will and a
clearly-defined vision of the
future.
We
are nearly 110 million persons
with a GDP in the neighborhood of
300 billion dollars and trade
totaling 80 billion dollars –that
is to say, with a relative weight--,
which we should bring to bear on
shaping the future, a future of
progress and well-being, of
justice and prosperity, goals for
which we have striven unflaggingly
since the very birth of our
republics.
There is proof today of the
definitive consolidation of a
regional consciousness and we can
finally see evidence that a common
regional identity exists: We call
and consider ourselves Andean
countries.
Yesterday, divided and out-of-step
–even clashing-- with each other,
we swam against the tide of
history. Today we move together
into the future, in agreement on
basic issues, precisely because we
address them from not only a
domestic approach, but also a
regional one.
Andean nationalism is, then, an
open nationalism, the result of
the dovetailing of our national
interests or, what amounts to the
same, the recognition of our
regional interests.
Andean reality, our actual degree
of institutional economic
development, of social
shortcomings, of infrastructural
shortages, our dependence on or
relationship with the developing
world, all give shape to a
regional personality of our own.
The in-depth and realistic
analysis of that regional
personality should produce the
solutions to our problems.
All
small, narrow, closed nationalisms
today run against the tide of
history; not so the region’s
nationalism, which occupies a
place in the global world
perfectly and coherently as an
economic and political bloc.
This
is the major challenge posed to
the Andean countries by the XXI
century and we must take an
audatious and modern approach in
responding to it.
It
is with deep satisfaction that I
hereby open this twelfth meeting
of the Andean Presidential Council.
Thank you very much.
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