In Guatemala, this week, is negotiating the future of political and trade relations between the EU and the countries of Central America. Friday 10 October, in fact, is scheduled for Fifth meeting of the working table discussing the terms dell'Acuerdo de Asociación between 27 EU countries and the republics of Central America (Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica).
Negotiations should be concluded within the first half of 2009, as promised by the European Commission to the President of Costa Rica, Oscar Arias, who recently visited Brussels. The conclusion of the bi-regional negotiations with Central America has become crucial for the European Commission, in fact, given the paralysis in the negotiations with the countries of the Andean Community (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru), the failure of those with the countries of Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP), the "fatigue" than with Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay).
On 1 October, in Brussels, a meeting was held between representatives of European civil society organizations, the chief negotiator of the European Commission, responsible and Petros Mavromichalis Directorate General for Trade, Nicolas Ardito.
In a memorandum dated October 3, Luis Guillermo Perez, Secretary of CIFCA (Copenhagen Initiative for Central America, a network of European organizations which puts pressure on EU member states on policies towards Central America), all this' meeting, noted that "integration is those who promote European business interest and not to the peoples of Central America. [By Ada] can significantly affect basic rights, such as the right to food, the right to life-through-the right to health, right to work, if you do not provide real security for workers and can further damage the environment, but also damage the rights of indigenous peoples, Afro-Colombian, peasant communities, fishermen, small and medium-sized enterprises. " The
Ada, Pérez concludes, will serve exclusively "local elites and European multinationals."
During the meeting, in fact, EU representatives have confirmed that the Association Agreement will, in practice, only a free trade agreement. "There will be no mechanism for monitoring by civil society", the EU will not pressure in any way, so that "counterparties or adjust to ratify international conventions on human rights," and does not intend to enter into of the issues of indigenous rights, labor rights and environmental protection. " Finally, they said, "you can enter any form of protection in the violation of specific human rights in the Association."
Unfortunately, the governments of several Central American countries (Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala) to push for a speedy conclusion dell'Accordoi. Elsewhere in South America, negotiations along the same path were stopped by strong opposition of local governments, in particular by the Bolivian facing the European Union that refuses to recognize, in the text, the asymmetries between Countries of the Andean Community Nations and the European Union and within countries in the Can, "says Pérez-a-ensuring special and differential treatment in particular in Bolivia and Ecuador, when the second set in July 2007. The 14th of October, the chairmen of the four countries of the Andean Community will meet in Guayaquil, Ecuador, to decide whether to continue the bi-regional negotiations with the European Union.
