Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel (L) speaks at the opening of the G77+China Summit at the Convention Palace in Havana, September 15, 2023 (AFP/YAMIL LAGE)
The G77+China summit, formed by around a hundred countries from Asia, Africa and Latin America representing 80% of the world’s population, began Friday in Havana with a call to “change the rules of the game” international economy.
Around thirty heads of state and government are participating in this two-day summit, including the Argentine President Alberto Fernandez, the Colombian Gustavo Petro, the Angolan João Lourenço, the Mozambican Filipe Nyusi, the Rwandan Paul Kagame, and even the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva arrived in the Cuban capital in the evening.
“After all the time when the North has organized the world according to its interests, it is now up to the South to change the rules of the game,” said Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, whose country occupies since January the rotating presidency of the group.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva gets off the plane at Jose Marti International Airport in Havana, September 15, 2023, to attend the G77+China summit (AFP/YAMIL LAGE)
The leader stressed that developing countries were the main victims of “the current multidimensional crisis in the world”, “cyclical disruptions in trade, international finance and unequal exchanges”, as well as global warming.
He condemned an “international architecture” which is “hostile to progress” in southern countries.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who is participating in the summit, spoke out for a world that was “more representative and better responsive to the needs of developing economies”, stressing that these countries were “trapped in a tangle of global crises “.
– “Public funds” –
Representatives from around a hundred countries are present in Havana for this extraordinary summit whose theme is the “role of science, technology and innovation” in development. On this occasion, the UN chief congratulated Cuba for the development of vaccines against Covid-19.
The Group, created in 1964 by 77 countries, now includes 134 nations. China participates as an external actor.
Cuban President Miguel Diaz Canel (r) greets Li Xi, a member of the standing committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China, upon his arrival at the Havana Convention Center, September 15, 2023 (POOL/AFP/Yamil LAGE)
Its representative, Li Xi, member of the standing committee of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party, insisted in his speech on the importance of “South-South cooperation”, while several speakers spoke of the global inequalities brought to light by the Covid-19 pandemic and the need to reduce the debt of the poorest countries to finance the climate transition.
“The weight of external debt, market volatility, difficulties in accessing the internet and climate change are serious obstacles to the progress of our nations,” stressed Angolan President João Lourenço.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro proposed “a universal negotiation” to reduce the debt of poor countries in order to free up “public funds that allow us to pay for the transition to a carbon-free economy”.
His Argentine counterpart estimated that southern countries now had a “huge opportunity to demand equality”. “It is in the global South that we find what the central world needs,” Mr. Fernandez said, referring to the richest countries. “It needs food that is produced in South America (…) it needs energy that is found in Arab countries (…) it needs lithium” from South America.
Former Cuban President Raul Castro (d) and United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres attend the inaugural session of the G77+China summit at the Convention Center in Havana, September 15, 2023 (AFP/ADALBERTO ROQUE)
In July, the UN chief stressed to the press that the “G77 was the voice of the global South, the largest group of countries on the international scene”, emphasizing that the “multiplicity of international summits” in different regions of the world “reflects the increasing multipolarity of our world”.
Mr. Guterres notably went in recent weeks to the Brics summit (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, soon to be extended to six new members) in Johannesburg and to the G20, a group of the most powerful economies in the world, in New Delhi.
The organization of this summit allows Cuba to demonstrate its diplomatic capacity, despite the economic difficulties shaking the communist country. A slow recovery from the pandemic, the strengthening of sanctions from Washington – which has imposed an embargo on Havana since 1962 – and internal structural weaknesses have plunged the country into a serious crisis.
© 2023 AFP
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