Summit of Americas Signals Reconciliation

The Fifth Summit of the Americas, held at Port-of-Spain, Trinidad and Tobago from April 17-19, 2009, signalled a new era in US-Latin American relationships. The Summit was a beneficially constructive opportunity for the 34 democratically elected leaders of the Hemisphere to meet. Organization of American States (OAS) called for reopening of talks between USA and Cuba. The occasion was memorable for President Obama’s handshakes with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez while sharing the book, “The Open Veins of Latin America”.

President Obama described the Summit of Americas as a “very productive” for progressive countries in the hemisphere as countries set aside “stale debates and old ideologies.”

“I am not interested in talking for the sake of talking,” Obama said in Port of Spain. “But I do believe that we can move US-Cuban relations in a new direction.”

The US and Cuba have not had full diplomatic ties in the aftermath of the 1959 communist revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power. Raul Castro formally succeeded his brother as president last year. The US currently issues about 20,000 immigration visas a year for Cubans who apply through a lottery system in the Cuban Interests Section in Havana.

Leaders of some Latin American countries had been pressing Obama to end the US embargo against Cuba, which has existed since 1962 after Castro expropriated the land of US citizens and companies and aligned himself with the Soviet Union. Before the US takes further steps, Obama has said Cuba needs to do more to ease travel restrictions on its citizens, free political prisoners and allow for freedom of speech and religion.

Meanwhile, the Summit of the Americas has gained the attention of the United Nations (UN) as being a symbol of unprecedented cohesion in the Western Hemisphere.

The observation was made by the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) Director General Len Ishmael at the ceremony to commence the UN Academic Council Conference on Emerging Powers at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine campus on 5 June.

Delivering the keynote address, Ishmael said the April summit provided an opportunity for Latin American countries and the Caribbean nations to speak with their large Northern neighbours, namely the USA and Canada, about issues directly affecting them.

Such cohesion in the region assists in the process of creating alliances, hence giving leverage to the small and middle size economies in the region.

The talks at the summit about the removal of the decades old trade embargo on Cuba were also commended by Ishmael as a step forward.

“The group saw the need to remove the last vestige of Cold War from the Hemisphere, mainly the removal of the embargo on Cuba,” said Ishmael. Cuba was not present at the April summit.

The 34 states are Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, United States of America, Uruguay and Venezuela. The official website for the Fifth Summit of America is http://www.fifthsummitoftheamericas.org.

EU Environment Chief for New Climate Change Agreement

EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas has called for greater urgency and ambition in international negotiations for a new global climate agreement, warning that it represents the world’s last chance to prevent climate change from reaching dangerous levels.

In his statement to mark World Environment Day of 5 June, which has climate change as its theme, Dimas said, “The new global climate agreement that is due to be finalised at the Copenhagen climate conference in December is the world’s last chance to prevent the dangerous, perhaps even catastrophic, levels of climate change projected by scientists to occur as early as 2050-well within the lifetimes of over a billion young people alive today”.

Last week a study for the Global Humanitarian Forum underlined the human tragedy climate change already represents. Today climate change seriously affects 325 million people every year, kills about 315,000 people a year through hunger, sickness and extreme weather, and causes global economic losses of over 125 billion dollars annually, the study estimates. These numbers are projected to rise substantially over the next 20 years.

To prevent dangerous climate change, the international scientific consensus tells us that global warming must be kept to less than 2°C above the pre-industrial temperature. This translates into around 1.2°C above today’s level since warming of 0.76°C has already occurred, and some studies suggest the amount of greenhouse gases already emitted makes it likely that further warming of up to 1°C is unavoidable.

The discussions under way in Bonn this week and next must take account of that. They need to inject greater momentum into the talks themselves and turn the draft negotiating texts now on the table into a blueprint for a sufficiently ambitious Copenhagen agreement.

To get global emissions onto the right track to prevent dangerous climate change, developed countries must start by cutting their collective emissions to 30 percent of their 1990 levels by 2020, in accordance with the science evidenced by the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The European Union has shown its leadership and determination by putting in place legislative measures to achieve a 20% reduction and by committing to scale this up to 30% if other countries agree to do their fair share.

We cannot win the battle against climate change unless developing countries, and particularly the big emerging economies, step up action to limit their rate of emissions growth. But only by setting a strong example themselves will developed countries succeed in convincing the developing world to join the global effort that Copenhagen must launch”.

Timothy Roemer to be new US Ambassador to India

Distinguished scholar and former Democratic Congressman Mr. Timothy Roemer will be the new US Ambassador to India. He will be replacing Mr. David Mulford who was Bush administration’s nominee. Now the appointment awaits confirmation from the US Senate.

Roemer, 52, served in the US House of Representatives from 1991-2003 before becoming the president of the Centre for National Policy (CNP), a Washington, DC-based national security think tank. He currently serves on the panel for Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism and the Blue-ribbon Commission created to investigate the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on USA. He has contributed vastly on nuclear non-proliferation initiatives.