The US announces a million-dollar anti-migration investment at the Summit of the Americas

USA announced this Tuesday new private investment commitments for almost 2,000 million dollars in Central America to curb migration, the essential issue in a IX Summit of the Americas tarnished by the boycott of several presidents, including that of Mexico.

This announcement, made by Vice President Kamala Harris, will allow attention to be diverted from the absences of the leaders of Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala and Bolivia, especially in protest against the exclusion of the governments of Nicaragua, Venezuela and Cuba, whom Washington Consider dictatorships. The one from Uruguay will not attend either, but in his case because he tested positive for covid-19.

There will be 1,900 million for Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador for new investments of some ten companies.

“These investments are creating an ecosystem of opportunity and helping to give people in the region hope to build safe and prosperous lives at home,” the White House said in a statement Tuesday.

With this new amount, the investment promises total 3,200 million dollars of private capital for the so-called Northern Triangle of Central America.

From these countries come most of the approximately 7,500 irregular migrants who cross the border between the United States and Mexico every day to flee misery, fear, corruption and violence.

A migratory flow that takes a political toll on the Biden government and could make it lose control of Congress in the mid-term elections in November.

At the Los Angeles summit, which will conclude on Friday, five documents will be adopted on key areas: democratic governance, health and resilience, climate change and environmental sustainability, the transition to clean energy and digital transformation.

Migration is left out but the Biden government hopes to sign a migration declaration for which it has Mexico, despite the boycott of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who will send Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard.

– “A very good relationship”-

“We are very confident that the countries that will sign the Declaration on Migration will be committed to its goals and that includes, just to clarify, Mexico,” a government official said Monday.

In the same vein, Ebrard declared on Tuesday that the relationship between the two countries “is very good, it is very extensive (…), it is positive and it will continue to be so.”

The situation of migrants in the 3,200 km of border shared by the two countries worries civil society, one of the pillars of the summit, according to Washington.

“The United States must face the problem of migration not from its lens, but from the collective lens” attending to the “roots but also with palliatives when the fact has already occurred” and the private sector plays an important role, Leonardo told AFP Martellotto, from the NGO JA Americas.

Civil society can contribute with solutions, but “the government has the magic wand of scale,” he said, insisting on the importance of promoting remote work in the countries of origin, the training of young people in difficulty and of the families that receive remittances so that they get the most out of them.

The exclusion of countries from the event continued to be talked about on Tuesday. Those excluded will be represented by the Argentine president, Alberto Fernández, as president pro tempore of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC).

“Unity is not declared, unity is exercised and the best way to exercise it is not to segregate anyone,” he said hours before leaving for Los Angeles.

This Tuesday Kamala Harris will also announce a women’s empowerment initiative, while the State Department will focus on the digital agenda and the independence of the press.

– Alliance and reforms-

On Wednesday, Biden will begin the most intense days of the summit with a speech.

Biden will announce an alliance with Latin America for economic prosperity, in full post-pandemic recovery, to mobilize investment, a government official reported.

And he will propose an “ambitious reform” of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) “to better address the region’s development challenge because the private sector has a central role,” he added. The United States will try to obtain an equity stake in the IDB to invest in the lending arm of the private sector and “direct them where they have the greatest impact.”

The US president will also announce more than 300 million dollars in assistance for the region in case of food insecurity, with the war in Ukraine as a backdrop.

The war unleashed by the invasion launched by Russian President Vladimir Putin has triggered the prices of some of the products in the family basket.

In addition to the summit, the program includes the Business Summit of the Americas, which starts this Tuesday night, a forum on youth of the Americas and another on civil society, which this Tuesday focused on democratic governance, which according to, Vanessa Neumann, the spokesperson for South America, is the nexus of the summit.

“Biden focuses on migration while Latin American leaders are also interested in development protocols such as nearshoring” or near relocation. Strengthening democracy and inclusion builds prosperity,” he told AFP.

Source: Elcomercio

Ronald Payne

I, Ronald Payne, am a journalist and author who dedicated his life to telling the stories that need to be said. I have over 7 years of experience as a reporter and editor, covering everything from politics to business to crime.