SELA and CELAC prepare forum on integration next Friday

On 16 December, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the Latin American and Caribbean Economic System (SELA) and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) will hold the forum “Responding to the challenges of integration for the development of Latin America and the Caribbean. Proposals from regional and subregional integration mechanisms,” with the objective of promoting cooperation and convergence among the various regional actors and encouraging integration for the development of Latin America and the Caribbean.

The forum will be held in hybrid modality (face-to-face and virtual) and will be presented by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, International Trade and Worship of the Argentine Republic, Santiago Cafiero, together with the Permanent Secretary of the Latin American and Caribbean Economic System (SELA), Ambassador Clarems Endara.

The meeting will be attended by authorities and representatives of regional, subregional and multilateral integration organisations of the region, as well as delegates of the member countries of CELAC and SELA, who will analyse the challenges of integration for the development of Latin America and the Caribbean.

The first panel: “The new challenges of integration for the development of Latin America and the Caribbean” will be moderated by Ambassador Gustavo Martínez Pandiani, Undersecretary for Latin American and the Caribbean, National Coordinator of the Presidency Pro Tempore of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). The second panel: "Convergence for Latin American and Caribbean integration” will be moderated by Oscar Laborde, Ambassador Plenipotentiary of the Argentine Republic in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

Jorge Pedraza, Secretary General of the Andean Community (CAN); Werner Vargas Torres, Secretary General of the Central American Integration System (SICA); Rodolfo Sabonge, Secretary General of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS); Christian Asinelli, Corporate Vice President of Strategic Programming at CAF-development bank of Latin America; Ney

Fernándes, Undersecretary of Development of the Free Trade Area of the Latin American Integration Association (ALADI); Guillermo Kaoutoudjian, Director of Integration of OLADE, and Ambassador Federico González Perini, Undersecretary of Mercosur and International Economic Negotiations of the Argentine Foreign Ministry - Pro tempore Presidency of the Common Market of the South (MERCOSUR), are part of the invited panellists at the Forum “Responding to the challenges of integration for the development of Latin America and the Caribbean. Proposals from regional and subregional integration mechanisms.”