PROSUR to the detriment of Latin American regional integration

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PROSUR will function as the OAS right-hand man and assist in the disappearance of the strength of regional integration

Currently, in Latin America, we live a political storm between ideologies that inhibit the cooperative and unifying process that was understood as part of the independent and self-sufficient process of the region to the detriment of an actor alien to the Latin American circumstances. It is not in vain that from the reverse of the "left" of the region, what was once built, we wanted to renew for something more prone to the interests of the new governments.

Leer en español: PROSUR en detrimento de la integración regional latinoamericana

A clear example is the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) launched as a fully Latin American integration body in 2007 as a link for the establishment of alliances between the Southern Cone nations independently of the guidelines promoted by Washington as it is the Organization of the American States (OAS).

However, there is much truth in that UNASUR was formed to encourage the Brazilian interest as a regional project (as a reinforcement of the Common Market of the South or MERCOSUR). The momentum gained was such that the other representatives of Latin American governments assumed the commitment to join this project as part of a possible South American security integration (very similar to the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, CELAC).

As such, this project, now of regional interest, sought an alternative to the Summit of the Americas and promoted a policy of joint security, outside the circle of influence of the United States, seen with great fear and uncertainty. The weak point of UNASUR came at the time of Dilma's impeachment in 2016, when the change of its meaning and its usefulness as a regional organization was lost so that since 2017, the General Secretariat remains vacant.

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Now, in the region, PROSUR is being promoted. The main actors of this possible new organism are Iván Duque, president of Colombia; Sebastián Piñera, president of Chile and; to a lesser extent, Mario Abdo Martínez, president of Paraguay. These characters together with the presidents of Argentina, Brazil, and Peru withdrew from UNASUR as an offensive against the regime of Nicolás Maduro.

PROSUR, claims to be a "different" body in terms of meeting objectives such as energy cooperation, "more democracy", independence of powers, "less bureaucracy" and defend the market economy. What is really intended to be defined is an organization that consolidates the nations that belong to the Lima Group to definitively fence the Maduro regime in Venezuela. This "new" body does not present as UNASUR a legal status that directs its relations between peers or that involves members to act together on a specific topic, rather, what is envisioned is a kind of high-level regional forum.

In addition, on March 21, both Jair Bolsonaro and Iván Duque will meet in Chile with Sebastián Piñera, where the final blow will be given to UNASUR. To this meeting, all the countries of the Southern Cone are "invited" with the exception of Venezuela because they "do not have the necessary requirements of democracy and individual liberties.

The problem is that the establishment of PROSUR would condemn an organization that has worked and that is not necessary to revert for its good management. It is in itself, a blow of the current Latin American governments that give off the value that the independence or the American autonomy meant in favor of the regional interest. PROSUR will become an agency at the service of the disappearance of the "Bolivarian" issue in the region and the consummation of a Neomonroism or Plan Condor II at the hands of the new conservative Latin American governments. It would be serious to repeat a regrettable event like the Cuban case in the OAS with the example of "Madurai" in Venezuela: it is not the government that suffers, but the people themselves.

LatinAmerican Post | Roberto Viesca

Translated from "PROSUR en detrimento de la integración regional latinoamericana"