Medellín, April 24, 2006

With this symbolic High-Level Forum that brings us together in the lovely, booming city of Medellín under the slogan of “Toward an Andean Community of Citizens,” our integration organization touches off the acts celebrating its thirty-seventh anniversary at a particularly difficult time in its institutional life.

The decision taken by the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela to withdraw from the Andean Community is now a known fact and, at the request of that country, on Wednesday the 26th of this month a meeting of the Commission will be held to formalize its repudiation of the Cartagena Agreement. Furthermore, the President of Bolivia yesterday spoke in harsh terms about the Andean Community and its Secretary General, that, as I pointed out in a press release issued last night in Lima, I attribute to his being misinformed. This morning, President Morales took the initiative of promoting a meeting of the Andean Presidents under certain conditions and whose results we await expectantly. The fact is that these events have clouded the future of our subregional integration process.

I have come to speak to you about this today, taking away from pressing hours of work at the headquarters of the General Secretariat, at this important Forum attended by over one hundred professionals and representatives of communications media of the Andean subregion, together with academics, politicians and institutions of civil society, because the situation we now confront requires analysis by the most lucid minds of our Andean and South American countries and the urgent and determined action of their leaders.

At this point, I would like to offer some thoughts that are the product of my longstanding dedication to integration tasks, my social vocation in favor of the welfare of our nations and the deeply-rooted democratic convictions that have always inspired my acts.

I consider that the situation we face today is the result of profound discrepancies among the Member Countries over the development model that best responds to social needs and over the type of participation in the world economy that should correspond to those objectives. It can also be attributed, however, to particular conceptions of the State’s organization and its relations with society, as well as different visions concerning international and regional relations and, above all, of the nature and end purposes of our Andean and South American integration processes.

Given the limited results obtained in terms of our peoples’ wellbeing from the so-called “Washington Consensus” and faced by the need to ensure the democratic governance of our countries, we can effectively say that Latin America has embarked upon a “social time”-- in other words, a new stage in which the priority concern of national political agendas will be to obtain tangible results, within politically acceptable periods of time, in the reduction of the poverty and inequality that prevail in our societies. In short, to overcome the exclusion of vast sectors of our populations from the political system, the benefits of economic growth, and even the prevailing cultural norms.

In this context, a variety of proposals have emerged about how to improve or change the economic model in order to reach those social goals and also about how to achieve a more inclusive State and society, all of this with the astonishing speed imparted by an electoral year, like the present one throughout the region. In this context, the regional integration model has also come in for questioning, because it is the closest space within the sphere of our external relations.

The main problem does not lie in that, however. The crisis arises and feeds on itself when those differences fail to be addressed through respectful and fraternal dialogue for a mutual understanding of needs and aspirations, when meetings are postponed and the communications media become the vehicles for spreading unease and abuse in their expression of mistrust.

It is necessary to react to this situation and to return to a path of dialogue and consensus, despite the existence of differences and precisely in order to assimilate them within a plural and tolerant space where cooperation and an effective, rather than a rhetorical, solidarity reign. All of this grounded in the conviction that unity may only be constructed on the basis of what we have labored for over the years, and not through the destruction of a Community heritage that undoubtedly has strengths to contribute toward achieving a more advantageous and socially inclusive development and participation in the world economy.

I would like, from here, to appeal to all of the political and social forces, particularly the citizens of this Community that we aspire to and must achieve, to participate in this effort to rescue our integration process and reinforce our unity.

And I urgently call upon the region’s Presidents to assume the leadership for which they are responsible, in order to build an Andean, South American and Latin American consensus in favor of socially inclusive development and participation in the world economy, resting on the principles of pluralism and mutual respect, for the unequivocal purpose of ensuring the wellbeing and unity that our nations demand.

Thank-you very much.